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Current Information @ St. James' Church
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PRESS RELEASE - ST JAMES’ FINCHAMPSTEAD
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Churches Together in Crowthorne - {Was Hope08}
St. James Finchampstead strives to reach out to the community by being one of the 3 churches together in Finchampstead and also “Churches Together in Crowthorne”. The latter organisation was able to develop the Hope initiative during 2008 by engaging with our local communities. These Hope activities will continue into 2009 and beyond. This involves all church denominations working together to try and make a difference to peoples’ lives.
Francis Moore & Sarah Owen.
Volunteers Needed
The Hope Team have been asked to support the Thames Valley Police again with the summer activities for young people on the Morgan Rec. Crowthorne. Last year a very successful scheme ran for 6 weeks from July 24th through to August 28th at 2.45 - 7pm latest each day.
All volunteers need to be CRB checked. Please consider if you can help - its good fun!
Further details Francis or Sarah; Tel. 0118 973 3111
Young people from St James will of course be welcome to take part in the activities.
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Articles listed below are:-
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Lecture delivered at St James’ Church Finchampstead; 17th Feb 2009
(First delivered at the Royal Society)
Modern Astronomy and Cosmology: Room for a Creator?
An explanation of our current understanding of the universe, how it began,
and a reflection on the religious implications.
by
Professor Russell Stannard OBE
Professor Emeritus of Physics at The Open University
'The more the Universe seems comprehensible, the more it also seems pointless'. The words of Nobel Laureate, Steven Weinberg in his book The First Three Minutes. He goes on to dismiss human life as 'a more-or-less farcical outcome of a chain of accidents'. Stephen Hawking in his best-selling popularisation of cosmology, A Brief History of Time, concludes with the question What place then for a creator?
The study of modern astronomy and cosmology is such that it is virtually impossible not to go beyond the science itself, and reflect on the possible significance of such findings for our understanding of ultimate questions - those to do with religion, purpose, and human significance in general.
What I want us to do this evening is to examine some of the issues raised to see whether the scientific study of the universe is as damaging to religious belief and to our own sense of worth as is sometimes portrayed?
So let me begin with a brief resume of what the universe is like and how it originated:
The Sun is a ball of fire. It is large enough to swallow up one million earths. It is but a medium-sized star, much like the others. Stars are gathered into great swirling whirlpools called galaxies. Ours is called the Milky Way Galaxy. It contains 100 000 million stars. There are other galaxies besides our own - some 100 000 million of them spread out over vast tracts of space
So how many stars are there altogether? Suppose we were to take a tiny grain of sand to represent each of these stars - each of these suns - how much sand would we need? A bucket full? A barrow load? A truck load? No. We would need enough to make a sand castle 5 miles long by 5 miles wide by 5 miles high.
The galaxies are spread out over vast tracts of space. The furthest lie so far from us that the light we receive from them today has taken 12 000 million years to reach us - even though it has been travelling at a speed of 300 000 kilometres per second. The galaxies are grouped together into clusters of galaxies, our own being a member of a cluster of about 30 galaxies.
When we look at distant galaxy clusters we find that they are all receding from us. The further away they are, the faster they are retreating off into the distance. This motion arises out of the way the universe began. According to the Big Bang hypothesis, we envisage that there was a time when all the contents of the Universe were together. They flew apart, and have been doing so ever since. From the motion of the galaxies and the distances they have travelled at those speeds, we can conclude that it happened 12 000 million years ago. It was such a cataclysmic event it seems natural to assume that it marked the point at which the Universe came into being. That being so it seems reasonable to ask what caused the Big Bang. And that is the first big question we are to address this evening.
The religious response is to say that God created the world. But there are those who do not see God as necessary for this purpose. They argue that the world might have created itself - spontaneously - one simply puts it down to a quantum fluctuation. So, what is meant by that?
In the days of classical Newtonian physics, one thought that everything that happens has to have a cause. Cause is followed by effect. Everything is predictable - at least in principle. If one repeatedly sets up the identical causal event, one always gets exactly the same effect.
With the advent of quantum theory all that changed. Now we know that from a given state of affairs, one can predict only the relative probabilities of a whole variety of possible later states. For instance, a 60% chance of one thing happening, a 30% chance of another, and a 10% chance of another. There is absolutely no way of determining in advance which way it will go; one just has to wait and see. As I said, all one can deal in are relative probabilities of various possible outcomes.
This element of uncertainty - unpredictability - affects everything happening in the world. The fact that it is not obvious in everyday life is because the effects only become noticeable on the small scale. This generally means one has to be examining the behaviour of individual atoms or of subatomic particles like electrons and protons. But the uncertainty is always there. In particular, one would expect quantum theory to be important in the very earliest stages of the universe, when the universe was very small.
This being so, some physicists have been led to propose that, starting from a state consisting of nothing, there might have been a small but finite probability that this would be succeeded by a state consisting of a Universe - a tiny universe of sub-atomic proportions - a universe that promptly underwent a Big Bang and became the enormous universe we know today. One has simply to wait around long enough for this quantum fluctuation to occur.
This then is a possible way, so it seems, for having the Universe spontaneously create itself, without the active involvement of any Creator God.
The proposal, at first sight at least, appears quite plausible, but it is not without its difficulties. Quantum theory was devised to account for the behaviour of the component parts of the Universe; it does not by any means follow that one is justified in applying it to the Universe as a whole. Indeed, quantum theory is the description of the observations of an observer. But who is supposed to be the 'observer' in this case - an observer who in some sense is outside the universe? It sounds suspiciously like God again. A further difficulty is that if there is a finite probability of this Universe popping into existence at some point in time, why not other universes at other points in time? Is one not led to the conclusion of there being universes without number? That seems a rather extravagant claim - a costly way of getting rid of a Creator God.
But setting aside for the moment these various objections, suppose for the sake of argument we were to concede that the world had its beginning in a quantum fluctuation, would that in fact undermine the idea of a Creator God?
I think not. It is all very well putting the Big Bang down to a quantum fluctuation, but why a quantum fluctuation? Why was it quantum physics that was in charge of the process rather than some other type of physics? After all, we can all dream up imaginary worlds run according to laws of nature different from our own. Science fiction writers do it all the time. Where is quantum physics supposed to have come from? Would it not have taken a God to have set up the laws of physics in the first place - a God who chose the laws for bringing this world (and perhaps others) into existence. This would have put God at one step removed from the origin of the Universe in that, instead of initiating the world by direct intervention, he created the law, it then being the natural outworking of that law that brought the world into existence. And yet responsibility for the existence of the world would ultimately have rested with the creator of the law - with God.
I wish now to turn to what I regard as the most intriguing aspect of the Big Bang. So far we have been speculating on what might have caused the Big Bang - a quantum fluctuation or God. But what I want to talk about now throws doubt on whether there was a cause at all.
In describing the Big Bang I have probably given you the idea that it was an explosion much like any other explosion - bigger, yes, but essentially the same. By that I mean that it takes place at a particular location in space. But this is not how it was with the Big Bang. Not only was all of matter concentrated initially at a point, but also all of space. There was no surrounding space outside the Big Bang.
Perhaps an analogy will help. Imagine a rubber balloon. Onto its surface we glue some 5p coins. The coins represent the galaxies. Now we blow air into the balloon. It expands. Suppose you were a fly that has alighted on one of the coins; what do you see? You see all the other coins moving away from you - the further the coin, the faster it is receding into the distance. A coin twice as far away as another is receding twice as fast. But that of course is the observed behaviour of the galaxies - they too are receding from us in exactly that manner.
So far we have thought of the galaxies as speeding away from us as they move through space. But with the balloon analogy in mind, we now have an alternative way of interpreting that motion. It is not so much a case of the galaxy moving through space, as the space between us and it expanding. The galaxy is being carried away from us on a tide of expanding space. Just as there is no empty stretch of rubber surface 'outside' the region where the coins are to be found (a region into which the coins progressively spread out), so there is no empty 3-dimensional space outside where we and the other galaxies are to be found.
It is this interpretation of the recession of the galaxies that leads us to conclude that at the instant of the Big Bang, all the space we observe today was squashed down to an infinitesimal point. Because of this, it becomes natural to suppose that the Big Bang not only marked the origins of the contents of the Universe, it also saw the coming into existence of space. Space began as nothing, and has continued to grow ever since.
That in itself is a remarkable thought. But an even more extraordinary conclusion is in store for us - once we acquaint ourselves with Einstein's theory of relativity. What it tells us is that space and time are more alike than one would guess from the very different ways we perceive and measure them. After all, we measure spatial distances with rulers and intervals of time with a watch or clock. Yet despite this, there is an exceedingly close link between the two, to the extent that we speak today of time as the 4th dimension. We are all familiar with the three spatial dimensions. Time is now to be added as the fourth. For our purposes, it is sufficient to accept that space and time are as indissolubly welded together as the three spatial dimensions are to themselves. One cannot have space without time, nor time without space.
The reason why I am telling you this now is because of what I said a little earlier about space itself coming into existence at the instant of the Big Bang. In the light of what I have now asserted about the indissoluble link between space and time, we can immediately proceed to the conclusion that the instant of the Big Bang must also have marked the coming into existence of time. This in turn means that there was no time before the Big Bang. Indeed, the very phrase 'before the Big Bang' has no meaning. The word 'before' necessarily implies a pre-existent time - but where the Big Bang was concerned, there was none.
Now, for those who seek a cause of the Big Bang - whether a Creator God or some impersonal agency - there is a problem here. We have already spoken of the causal chain: cause followed by effect. Note the word 'followed': it refers to a sequence of events in time: first the cause, then the effect. But in the present context we are regarding the Big Bang as the effect. For there to have been a cause of the Big Bang, it would have had to have existed prior to the Big Bang. But this we now think of as an impossibility.
It was this lack of time before the Big Bang that prompted Hawking in his book A Brief History of Time to remark 'What place then for a creator?' Without there being any time, it certainly gets rid of the kind of creator God that most people probably have in mind: a God who at first exists alone. Then at some point in time God decides to create a world. The blue touch paper is lit, there is a Big Bang, and we are on our way. God becomes the cause of the Big Bang. But as we have seen, without time before the Big Bang, there could not have been a cause in the usual sense of that word.
It has to be said that exactly the same problem confronts the alternative idea we have been discussing whereby the cause of the Big Bang is thought to have been a quantum fluctuation. According to that scheme, an initial state consisting of nothing was (thanks to the quantum fluctuation) 'followed' by a world that promptly underwent the Big Bang. In the absence of any prior time, there could no more have been that kind of 'initial' state (one that could undergo a quantum fluctuation), than there could have been a God. Indeed, the only kind of quantum fluctuations we know of are those that occur in space as well as in time. Prior to the Big Bang, there was neither.
So, where have we got to? Have these considerations dispensed with a creator God? Before jumping to that conclusion, let us consider the following quotation:
'It is idle to look for time before creation, as if time can be found before time. If there were no motion of either a spiritual or corporeal creature by which the future, moving through the present, would succeed the past, there would be no time at all... We should therefore say that time began with creation, rather than that creation began with time.'
If the archaic expression 'either a spiritual or corporeal creature' had been replaced by a more up to date one - such as 'a physical object' - one could well have thought that the quote came from some modern cosmologist like Hawking, or from Einstein. In fact, those are the words of St Augustine. I think you will agree, they beautifully sum up what I have been trying to say. Modern cosmologists find it hard to come to terms with the fact that, where the beginning of time is concerned, it was a theologian who got there before them - and by 1500 years.
How did he do it - bearing in mind that St Augustine obviously knew nothing about the Big Bang? He argued somewhat along the following lines:
How do we know that there is such a thing as time? It's because things change. Physical objects (for instance, the hands of a clock) occupy certain positions at one point in time, and move to other positions at another. If nothing moves (or in the past had ever moved), there would be nothing to distinguish one point in time from another. There would be no way of working out what the word 'time' was supposed to refer to; it would be a meaningless concept. A fortiori, if there were no objects at all, moving or stationary (because they had not been created), clearly there could be no such thing as time.
In this way, Augustine cleverly deduced that time was as much a property of the created world as anything else. And being a feature of that world, it needed to be created along with everything else. Thus it makes no sense to think of a time that existed before time began. In particular it makes no sense to think of a God capable of pre-dating the world.
Yet despite all this, Augustine remained one of the greatest Christian teachers of all time. His realisation of the lack of time before creation clearly had no adverse effect on his religious beliefs. To understand why this should be so, we have to draw a distinction between the words 'origins' and 'creation'. Whereas in normal everyday conversation we might use them interchangeably, in theology they acquire their own distinctive meanings. So for example, if one has in mind a question along the lines of 'How did the world get started?' that is a question of origins. As such, it is a matter for scientists to decide, their current ideas pointing to the Big Bang description.
The creation question, on the other hand, is quite different. It is not particularly concerned with what happened at the beginning. Rather it is to do with: 'Why is there something rather than nothing?' It is as much concerned with the present instant of time as any other. 'Why are we here? To whom or to what do we owe our existence? What is keeping us in existence?' It is an entirely different matter, one not concerned with the mechanics of the origin of the cosmos, but with the underlying ground of all being.
It is for this reason one finds that whenever theologians talk about God the Creator, they usually couple it with the idea of God the Sustainer. His creativity is not especially invested in that first instant of time; it is to be found distributed throughout all time. We exist not because of some instantaneous action of God that happened long ago - an action that set in train all the events that have happened subsequently - an inexorable sequence requiring no further attention by God. We do not deal with a God who lights the blue touch - and retires. He is involved at first hand in everything that goes on.
So much for reflections deriving from Hawking's writings.
How about Weinberg's assessment of the Universe as being pointless and of human life as being but a farcical outcome of a chain of accidents? Is the nature of the Universe, as revealed by modern astronomy and cosmology, such that one can only conclude that life is a chance by-product?
It is not difficult to appreciate how Weinberg arrives at such a gloomy assessment. Take for example the size of the Universe. Are we really expected to believe that God designed it as a home for humans? If so, it appears to be somewhat excessive - a case of over-design perhaps.
Most places in the Universe are hostile to life. The depths of space are incredibly cold; that is why most planets are freezing. To be warm a planet needs to be close to a star. But get too close - like Mercury and Venus - and they become too hot. And of course the most prominent objects in the sky, the Sun and the other stars, are in themselves balls of fire and hence not suitable places to find life. Planets tend to be without atmospheres, or if they do have one, it is likely not to be the right sort for sustaining life.
For the great majority of the history of the Universe there was no intelligent life. After a further 5000 million years our Sun will swell up to become a red giant. Though it is unlikely that its fiery surface will reach out far enough to engulf the Earth, our planet will become unbearably hot, and all life will be burned up. This assumes that life has not already been eliminated through the violent impact of a meteorite, like the one that hit Jupiter recently.
And what of the long-term future of the Universe as a whole and of life elsewhere? We have spoken much about the origins of the Universe in the Big Bang, but what of its end?
We have seen how the Universe is expanding. The distant galaxies of stars are still receding in the aftermath of the Big Bang. But as they rush off into the distance, they are slowing down. This is due to gravity, each galaxy exerting an attraction on every other one. Keep this up, and eventually the galaxies will be brought to a halt. Except that we have to remember that the force of gravity reduces with increasing distance. So the slowing down force is steadily reducing with time.
The big question is then whether it will have managed to stop the galaxies before its force essentially vanishes to nothing, or whether the speeds of the galaxies are so great they will succeed in escaping the pull of gravity.
If it is the first, then the galaxies will one day come to a halt, and from then on will be drawn back towards each other. All their separations will reduce until eventually everything comes piling back on top of each other in a Big Crunch - with obviously the extinction of all life. So that is one possible scenario.
The alternative is that gravity is too weak to stop the galaxies, and they will continue flying apart for ever. What would be the significance of that for life in the cosmos?
Each star has only a limited amount of fuel. Eventually its fires must go out. For a medium sized star like the Sun that takes a time of the order of 10 000 million years (the Sun is about half way through its active life). More massive stars have more fuel, but they achieve higher temperatures and burn their fuel faster - so much faster they might live for only 1 million years. As each star exhausts its fuel, it becomes cold and no longer able to keep companion planets warm enough to sustain life.
Mind you, new stars continue to form. A star is created when the hydrogen and helium gas that was emitted originally from the Big Bang collects together under the influence of its mutual gravity. It squashes down, heating up as it does so (in the same way as air squashed down in a bicycle pump gets hot). If enough gas is collected, the temperature rise becomes sufficient at the centre to ignite nuclear fusion. In a very hot gas, the atomic nuclei are moving about so fast they can fuse together to form heavier nuclei. These heavier nuclei are so efficiently packed together that they are able to release unwanted energy - the energy of nuclear fusion. (The modest heat of the squashed-down gas acts only as a trigger to get the much more energetic nuclear fusion reactions going, in the same way as the lighting of a domestic coal fire involves first setting light to some screwed up paper - the small output of heat from this being the trigger to get the coal burning.)
Not all the gas from the Big Bang was used up in producing the first generation of stars. Our own Sun was one of those formed at a later stage. Still more stars are to be seen today in the very earliest phases of getting underway. But it is clear that this is not something that can go on indefinitely. At some stage, all the hydrogen and helium gas will have been drawn together to form stars, or will have been dispersed so thinly as never to be incorporated into a star. From then on the last stars live out there active lives, and die. Everything cools down, and we are left with the Heat Death of the Universe.
So what we find is that if we are dealing with a Universe where the expansion goes on for ever, there will come a point when there can be no further life. One is then left with an ever dispersing, lifeless Universe for an infinity of time. So Big Crunch, or Heat Death, the future is bleak for life either way. Yes, as I said, it is easy to see how Weinberg was led to the conclusion that the Universe seems pointless, and life is but an accidental by-product of no significance.
Or is it?
In the first place we need to guard against being irrationally overwhelmed by the sheer size of astronomical objects. Certainly there are contexts where size is significant. From a purely physical standpoint, the Sun is clearly more important than we are. After all, we go round the Sun; the Sun does not go round us. But would you want to swap places with the sun? Even though you might like to feel important, is that sufficient reason for changing places? The answer obviously is no. What's the point of being important if you don't know that you're important - and presumably the Sun does not know that it's important because it does not know anything - it's not conscious. The Sun is big, but essentially simple in structure - certainly simple compared to the complexity of the human brain - that complexity being linked in some way to the mystery of our consciousness. No, when it comes to the question of human dignity, we surely ought to be more concerned with consciousness than with questions to do with mere size.
As Blaise Pascal once put it: It is not in space that I must seek my human dignity, but in the ordering of my thought... Through space the Universe grasps me and swallows me up like a speck; through thought, I grasp it.'
So much for wise words dating from the 17th century. I wish now to change tack and introduce you to some reflections on the cosmos of a very different nature. These have surfaced only comparatively recently - in the last couple of decades. They go under the general heading: The Anthropic Principle.
To see what it is about, I want you to imagine that you are going to make a universe. You have freedom to choose the laws of nature and the conditions under which your imaginary universe is to operate. The aim is to produce a universe that is tailor-made for the development life - the kind of universe God presumably ought to have created if it were really intended primarily as a home for life.
The first decision is how violent to make your Big Bang. You might feel for example that the actual Big Bang was somewhat excessive if the aim was simply to produce some life-forms. It turns out that if you make the violence of your Big Bang somewhat less - only a little less - then the mutual gravity operating between the galaxies will get such a secure grip that the galaxies will slow down to a halt, and will thereafter be brought together in that Big Crunch I was telling you about. Moreover, all this happens in a shorter time that 12 000 million years - the time needed for evolution to produce us. So, turn the wick down, and you get no intelligent life.
All right you might say, I'll turn the wick up a little. I'll make my Big Bang just a little more violent than the actual one. What happens now, is that the gases come out of the Big Bang so fast that they do not have time to collect together to form embryo stars before they are dispersed into the depths of space. There being no stars, you get no life.
In fact it turns out that as far as the Big Bang violence is concerned, the window of opportunity is exceedingly narrow. If you are to get life in your universe, the thrust must be just right - and that is what our actual Universe has managed to do.
The next point to consider is the force of gravity. How strong will you make it in your imaginary universe? If you make it a little weaker than it actually is you will collect gas together after the Big Bang but not enough to produce a temperature rise sufficient to light the nuclear fires. No stars - no life.
On the other hand, you must be careful not to have your gravity too strong. That way you would get only the very massive types of star. Recall what I said earlier about massive stars burning themselves out in only 1 million years. For evolution to take place you must have a steady source of energy for 5 000 million years - you need a medium sized star like the Sun. Indeed when you come to think of it, the Sun is a remarkable phenomenon. After all, what is a star? It is a nuclear bomb going off SLOWLY. Have you any idea how difficult that is to achieve? Yet the amazing thing is that the Sun manages this. The secret is the way the force of gravity in the Sun conspires to feed the new fuel into the nuclear furnace at just the right rate for the nuclear fires (governed by the nuclear force - an entirely different force from that of gravity) to consume it at a steady rate extending over a period of 10 000 million years.
So, in order for there to be life, the force of gravity must lie within a very narrow range of possible values - and the gravity of the actual Universe does just that.
Next we must turn our attention to the materials from which we wish to build the bodies of living creatures. This is no small matter. After all, what do we get coming from the Big Bang? The two lightest gases - hydrogen and helium - and precious little besides. And it has to be that way. Remember we need a violent Big Bang to stop the Universe from collapsing back in on itself prematurely. And because of that violence, only the lightest nuclei could survive the collisions occurring at that time - anything bigger getting smashed up again soon after its formation. But you can't make interesting objects like human bodies out of just hydrogen and helium. So the extra nuclei - those that go to make up the 92 different elements found on Earth - must be manufactured somehow after the Big Bang. That's where the stars have another important role to play. Not only do they provide a steady source of warmth to energise the processes of evolution, they first serve as furnaces for fusing light nuclei into the heavy ones that will later be needed for producing the bodies of the evolving creatures.
But we are not home and dry yet. Perhaps the most important atom in the making of life is that of carbon. In a sense it is an especially 'sticky' kind of atom very good at cementing together the large molecules of biological interest. But forming a nucleus of carbon is by no means easy. Essentially it consists in fusing three helium nuclei together. This is as unlikely as to have three moving snooker balls colliding simultaneously. Without me going into any details as to how this comes about - let me just say that it involves something called a nuclear resonance. The occurrence of this resonance is so highly fortuitous, that its discoverer, one-time atheist Fred Hoyle now declares 'a commonsense interpretation of the facts suggests that a superintellect has monkeyed with the physics'.
So we have our precious carbon. A collision between some of these carbon nuclei and further helium nuclei yields oxygen - another vital ingredient for life - and so on. Thus you must be sure in your imaginary universe to incorporate a fortuitous nuclear resonance.
Does this mean that the stage is now set for evolution to take over, and convert these raw materials into human beings?
Not so. We have our materials, but where are they? They are in the centre of a star at a temperature of about 10 million degrees. Hardly an environment conducive to life. The materials have to be got out. But how? What happens is that a proportion of the newly synthesised material is ejected by supernova explosions. These occur when massive stars - several times the mass of our Sun - run out of fuel. They suddenly collapse in on themselves. But that raises a problem. How can an implosion produce and explosion? This was a conundrum that exercised the minds of astrophysicists for many years. In the event the mechanism turned out to be the strangest imaginable. The material is blasted out by neutrinos. Neutrinos are famous for hardly ever interacting with anything. One could pass a neutrino though the centre of the Earth to Australia a 100 000 million times before it had a 50:50 chance of hitting anything. They are incredibly slippery. How fortunate they were not any more slippery than they are.
The material is now out among the interstellar gases. In time, this collects together to form a dense cloud, which squashes down to form a star. Outside the star there can be secondary eddies that settle down to form planets. It is now possible to have rocky planets like Earth, Mercury, Venus, and Mars. For the first generation of stars this had not been the case because at that stage there had only been hydrogen and helium around. Given a planet at a reasonable position away from the star for a temperate climate to prevail, one has now at last got a chance of life evolving from the primordial slime.
How likely this is to happen is not known. If one is a physicist one tends to be impressed by the vast number of planets there must be out there - in other words how many attempts one is allowed to produce intelligent life. On this assessment, one is indeed home and dry. If on the other hand you are a biologist, you might be more impressed by the size of the hurdles that have still to be negotiated on the way to intelligent life - like for example the formation of the first cell. You might therefore be inclined to think that there must be some more 'coincidences' to follow - biological ones this time rather than the physical ones we have been considering.
The sum total of all these coincidences that have led to the universe being hospitable to life goes under the name: The Anthropic Principle.
It is impossible to put a hard figure on the likelihood of getting life from simply throwing together a bunch of physical laws at random - laws incorporating arbitrary values for the various physical constants. In talking for example about the strength of gravity having to lie within a narrow range, it is impossible to be more quantitative unless there is some way of specifying a permissible range of values that the strength could conceivably take on. If it could be any value whatsoever, then the finite range would be divided by infinity - and the chances would be virtually zero. Whatever the true odds come out to be, it is probably fair to say that to have a universe that is appropriate for the development of life is less likely than winning first prize in the Lottery.
So we are faced with the simple fact that the universe, far from being hostile to life, has seemingly bent over backwards to accommodate life. As the physicist Freeman Dyson has put it, 'The universe knew we were coming.'
Of course, in speaking of life, we are not restricting our thoughts merely to human life here on earth. There could well be intelligent life throughout the cosmos. Indeed, some examples of extraterrestrial life could be more advanced than ourselves. Whether that is likely, and if so, how that would affect our sense of human worth, is in itself another fascinating field of speculation.
The mysterious appropriateness of the Universe for the evolution of life is something that calls for explanation. There appear to be three possibilities:
The first is to pin one's faith on science, and to assert that in the end, science will one day be able to demonstrate that there is no mystery; there is no need to invoke coincidences. Things simply have to be the way they are.
The second way of addressing the Anthropic Principle is to assert that our Universe is not alone. There are a great many universes - perhaps an infinite number of them - and they are all run on different lines with their own laws of nature. The vast majority of them have no life in them because one or other of the conditions were not met. In a few, perhaps in only the one, all the conditions happen by chance to be satisfied and there life was able to get a hold. The probability of a universe being of this type is small but because there are so many attempts, it is no longer surprising that it should have happened. We being a form of life ourselves must, of course, find ourselves in one of these freak universes.
This is a suggestion that has been put forward by some scientists, but that does not make it a scientific explanation. For one thing, the other universes are not part of our Universe and so by definition cannot be contacted. There is therefore no way to prove or disprove their existence. Not only that but the suggestion goes against the conventional way scientific development has tended to go. Scientists generally go for the simplest, most economical explanations. It is what we call the application of Occam's Razor. To postulate the existence of an infinite number of universes all run according to their own laws of nature is to go as far in the opposite direction as is imaginable. Which is not in itself to say that the idea of an infinite number of universes is wrong - merely that it does not count as science.
So, an infinite number of universes is the second way of accounting for the Anthropic Principle. The third alternative is simply to accept that the Universe is a put-up job; it was designed for life, and the designer is God.
Now, one always gets a little bit worried over arguments in favour of the existence of God based on Design. The original Argument from Design held that everything about our bodies, and those of other animals, is so beautifully fitted to fulfil its function that it must have been designed that way - the designer being God - and therefore you must believe in God. The rug was pulled from under that argument by Darwin's theory of evolution by Natural Selection - at least in terms of it being a knock-down proof of God's existence - one aimed at convincing the sceptic.
So it is I would urge caution on those religious believers tempted to make too much of this new Argument from Design - one based this time on physics and cosmology. It is my contention that one can neither prove nor disprove God on the basis of such reasoning. If one is inclined to reject the idea of God, then one can do so in the expectation that science will one day show how the coincidences are not really coincidences, or it can be done on the grounds of there having probably been many attempts at different universes, so it is again not surprising that the world we know about comes to be the way it is. On the other hand, if one already believes in God on other grounds, say on the basis of religious experience, then the simplest explanation is in terms of a Designer God. For religious believers, such an explanation introduces no fresh assumptions at all, over and above what one already accepts as the explanation of other features of one's life.
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Lecture delivered at St James’ Finchampstead 10th February 2009
DARWIN AND THE THEORY OF EVOLUTION.
DO SCIENCE AND CHRISTIANITY NEED TO BE IN CONFLICT?
An examination of the perceived conflicts between science and religion with particular reference to evolution.
By Martin Rogers
Director of the Science and Religion in Schools Project
I am very pleased to be with you this evening. Thank you Richard for inviting me.
Let me say, before we begin, that I think the most productive side of an evening like this can be the questions and discussion we have after I have spoken. I don’t know what particularly interests and puzzles you about the debate between the claims of science and those of Christianity (and other religions). So hearing about your views and responding to your questions will be especially interesting to me and, I hope, valuable to you. So while I am talking, you will be thinking about any points you would like to make afterwards. These could be based on something I have said or they could be points which I have not covered. I would like to hear from you.
In all our beliefs and attitudes, although we have a great deal in common, we also have our own individual viewpoints; influenced by our own histories. So I will say a little about mine.
I first learnt about Evolution from Arthur Mee’s ‘Children’s Encyclopaedia’, which my parents bought for me and my sister when I was about 8. There were, I think, ten volumes, most of which had an article on a particular phase of evolution. I found it fascinating; not only the Dinosaurs!
My parents did not go to church, other than for marriages or funerals and Christianity came later. I learnt something at school, but it never made much impression, even though I was confirmed. We all were in those days in my school. It wasn’t until I went to University that my friends there and a remarkable college chaplain, helped me to take Christianity seriously. I read Science (Natural History) for part 1 at Cambridge and, finding the teaching there rather boring, changed to History for part 2 of the Tripos. In my case my Science came before my Christianity, which I think made it easier for me.
After a short spell in industry I became a Chemistry teacher (school master) and that is when I first came across the confusion, amongst young people, between their understanding of science and of their religious beliefs. The School Chaplain at the school had discovered that I went to church so he asked me to teach some R.E. (Now usually known as Religious Studies). For this I had absolutely no qualifications but he said that didn’t matter! The boys he wanted me to teach (in addition to my Chemistry of course) were aged about 13. What was I to do?
I hit on the idea of asking them to write short essays on “What I believe”; that is about their basic beliefs. This is what first showed me the confusion in young people’s minds. “I believe that Science and not God made the world”, wrote one boy, showing that he was as confused about Science as about Theism. “I have a schizophrenia between my religious beliefs and my understanding of Science” wrote another. Schizophrenia is a serious condition.
On a lighter note, boys can be quite bright. Over lunch a Headmaster said to the boy next to him, ‘It was a miracle that you passed that exam’. The boy replied, ‘May I pass you the wine’.
It was many years later when at Oxford that I met Professor John Hedley Brooke, Professor (at that time) of Science and Religion at Harris Manchester College, that I was able to make a contribution to that problem with the ‘Science and Religion in Schools Project’ for which you have the leaflets. I have brought some of our Guides for Secondary and Primary Schools. If you have contacts with schools as a teacher or governor, for instance, and would like a copy or copies of these Guides I would be pleased to let you have them. The object of the project is to encourage ‘Open minded and informed discussion about the claims of Religions and those of Science’.
Now for the main part of what I want to say. I will start with a story I rather like.
A man was climbing up a steep path on a mountain, sheer cliffs one side, vertical drop the other, when round the corner appeared a lion. The man terrified went down on his knees to pray. To his amazement the lion went down on its knees to pray. “This is wonderful” said the man, “we both have the same faith”! “I wouldn’t be too sure” replied the lion, “I am saying grace”.
I like to think of this story as an allegory. Is ‘Science’ like an angry lion, an enemy which is about to eat Christians up? I want to tell you this evening why I think this is not the case.
First we must ask ‘What is Science’? There is so much misunderstanding about this, not least amongst scientists.
Science is a method of investigating the natural world. It is built on evidence, but a particular sort of evidence, and on hypotheses and theories which are based on this evidence. Strictly speaking hypotheses and theories are not the same thing, but they are sometimes spoken of as if they were.
First, the evidence used in science, which as I said is a particular kind of evidence. I call it reproducible evidence, because the observations and experiments which produce this evidence must give consistent results - the same in August in Australia as in November in New York. This is not to be compared with the normal evidence we come across in our daily lives much of which is ‘unique’ and cannot strictly speaking be reproduced. We often think we would like to repeat a particular personal experience but it will never be quite the same.
Science is also limited to time/space phenomena; so the concept of ‘before’ time/space is not meaningful to science.
On the basis of that evidence Scientists produce their theories which ‘explain’ (and I put that word in inverted commas) the observations. I read a nice simple example of the relationship between evidence and theories in the paper last week. It said that older female Orca (or ‘Killer Whales’) were better mothers than younger ones. The evidence for this was that more of their babies survived to adulthood. This evidence is ‘reproducible’ and you can check it out by making the observations again with another group of Orcas. The article went on to say that two theories (perhaps the article called them ‘possible causes’) might account for this. One was the ‘attentive mother hypothesis’ that the older whales had fewer and ultimately no more babies which gave them more time to look after their young. The other was that they had more maternal experience. How could we decide which hypothesis was correct? Or both? By getting more evidence of course. You could measure the time they were together. Observe the techniques that they use for looking after their young and see if they changed as the mother got older.
Another example of a scientific theory is Newton’s famous Theory of Gravity. In Newton’s time there was already a great deal of evidence about the movement of the planets round the sun and the moon round the earth as well as the movement of objects on earth. Newton’s Law, you may remember from your school days, states that the ‘force of gravity’ by which matter is attracted to itself, is proportional to the masses of the pieces of matter concerned and inversely proportional to the square of the distance between them. This was an enormously successful theory which is still used today. It will get you to the moon and back – if you want to go! But, as happens to theories, it was succeeded nearly 200 years later by Einstein’s Theory of Relativity which is a better predictor, particularly as an object travels at a speed near to the space of light. Now Einstein’s Theory itself is being questioned.
To sum up, scientific evidence remains consistent (well usually – sometimes scientists get it wrong) but grows in quantity and accuracy. Scientific hypotheses and their theories are always liable to be changed or modified.
Now let’s look at the theory of Evolution. Some people say “it’s only a theory”. But that is misleading. It is a theory based on a vast amount of evidence. What is this evidence?
And there is much more.
And what are the theories which are based on this evidence?
(b) That the earth is about 4.56 billion years old and early forms of life are thought to have
started to appear about 100 million years later.
Denis Alexander has written an excellent book, which I strongly recommend, with the title ‘Creation or Evolution – Do we have to choose’? In it he describes how, if we look at the history of the earth as if it were a 24 hour clock starting at zero with the present time as midnight, then, simple forms of life would be appearing at 2.40am, single cell organisms flourishing by 5.20am. But single celled creatures with nuclei do not appear until around lunch time (a very long gap), multi cell organisms about 8.15pm. At 9.10pm, in an amazing 3 minutes, a great diversity of phyla appear (the Cambrian explosion). At 9.58pm the mass extinction 0f the Devonian period takes place and at 10.11pm reptiles appear, followed by the earliest mammals and dinosaurs at 10.50pm, and the first birds at 11.15pm. Just two minutes before midnight hominids start to appear and just 3 seconds before midnight humans make their entry. Recorded human history is one fifth of a second. The blinking of an eye! It puts things in perspective.
I doubt if these figures will change greatly. What is much less certain is how this process of
evolution actually ‘works’. Darwin’s theory was essentially ‘the survival of the fittest’. Not his
phrase incidentally. That phrase was first mentioned by Herbert Spencer in his ‘Principles of
Biology’ published in 1864. Darwin’s ‘On the Evolution of Species’ was published, as we can hardly help knowing, 150 years ago in 1859.
In view of what I have said about theories changing, I was interested to see on the cover of a recent issue of the New Scientist (24th January 2009) the headline ‘Darwin was wrong’. But don’t get too excited. The article was actually called ‘Uprooting Darwin’s Trees’ and showed how species do not evolve through a simple ‘tree and branch’ structure but sometimes through a sort of ‘cross fertilization’ between species. So the theory is modified.
As Keith Ward wrote recently in the Oxford Diocese publication ‘The Door’ (Feb 09), “We are only at the beginning of our understanding of the mechanisms of evolution and no-one should pretend that we know exactly how it all works”.
There are other theories which may change. For instance there are some scientists who are
advocating a ‘Big Bounce’ in replacement of the ‘Big Bang’. This is the idea that the universe
oscillates between expansion and contraction. There is little evidence to support this
at present. But it is a possibility.
An interesting point is that some scientists are nervous about a universe that has the very
special qualities, surprisingly precise you could say, that allows life at all and that has a beginning and, presumably an end. Could it be that this looks too much like a universe which has purpose or is even created by God?
A further hypothesis which appears to be a result of the nervousness that some scientists have
about ‘purpose’ is that of the ‘Multiverse’. This is the idea that there are an infinite
number of universes and we just happen to be on the one which is ‘fine tuned’ for life.
By definition we cannot contact other universes, presumably in different time-space systems,
so there is, and probably never can be, any evidence to support the idea. In my view this
does not make it a valid scientific hypothesis. It’s just another neat way of getting round the idea that our universe might possibly have purpose ingrained in it.
Thinking of the difference between an hypothesis and a theory, the OED describes an
hypothesis as ‘A provisional supposition which accounts for known facts and serves as a
starting-point for further investigation by which it may be proved or disproved’ (1646).
And a theory as ‘A scheme or system of ideas or statements held as an explanation or
account of a group of facts or phenomena’ (1638). You can see why there is confusion.
In fact all scientific theories are in a sense hypotheses. The ‘multiverse’ hardly even justifies
that term. Perhaps we should just call it an idea.
Back to Darwin for a moment. He was a remarkable man for whom I have a great respect.
Among other things he was a great collector of evidence. Even at school he collected
beetles and on his famous Beagle voyage he filled much of the ship with specimens of
creatures he discovered and fossils he found, to the irritation of the captain. From time to
time during his five year voyage round the world from 1831 to 1836 (including his famous visit to the Galapagos Islands) he would send batches home.
He never stopped collecting but he also got others to collect for him. Three years after his
return from the Beagle voyage(1831-1836) he married his cousin Emma Wedgwood. When they
moved to Downe House he began to fill every garden shed, then half the rooms of the house with his enormous collection. It was as well that Emma had a great deal of patience. Their’s was a rock solid marriage but marked by the tragedies of the early deaths of some of their children. The death of Annie at the age of ten in 1851 was the one that hit him hardest. Some have said that it was responsible for his loss of faith, but it was not as simple as that. As is well known Darwin’s father expected (wanted) him to go into the Church and that was his supposed intention when he was at Cambridge. But there is no evidence of great enthusiasm on Darwin’s part and he had certainly changed his mind by the time he returned from his Beagle voyage. He wanted to devote his life to his biological interests. Fortunately for him he inherited enough money to enable him to do so without taking paid employment.
It is never easy to see into someone’s inner mental and spiritual life. Darwin clearly had doubts about conventional ‘theology of nature’ during his ‘voyaging’ and was well aware of the
controversial nature of the theory of ‘the origin of the species’ which was developing in his mind. It was this that delayed the publication of ‘On the Origin of Species’ until 1859. And he only published then because his younger friend Alfred Wallace had come to similar conclusions which he was about to make public. Darwin understandably wanted the credit he deserved.
As far as his faith was concerned, 1849 was a significant date. Before that he would accompany his wife (who was a devout Christian) and family to church on Sundays. After that he would leave them at the church door and go for a walk. Later in his life, he described himself as agnostic. Sometimes, he said, he was a theist, sometimes not. There have been rumours that he returned to Christianity late in his life. But these are without foundation.
Darwin was, incidentally not the originator of the idea of evolution. His grandfather, Erasmus Darwin(1731-1802) was an early evolutionist. See Janet Browne’s excellent 2 volume biography ‘Charles Darwin’ published in 2005.
Of course the publication of ‘On the Origin of Species’ in 1859 had a considerable impact.
It is always remembered that senior church Bishops came out against it and that Disraeli, when he was a guest speaker at the Oxford Diocesan Conference in 1864, said ‘Is man an ape or an angel? I am on the side of the angels.’ But then he was a politician... What is not so well recognised is that some clergymen, notably Charles Kingsley, welcomed ‘The Origin of Species’ from the beginning, saying that he had no problems in accepting Darwin’s theory.
Before turning from Science and Evolution to our reactions as Christians, I want to mention
three ideas which are often associated with science and are supported by some scientists
which I think are misleading and mistaken. I call them ‘scientific heresies’.
The first is ‘Scientism’. This is an extreme view, apparently supported by Richard Dawkins
among others, and is associated with ‘Materialism’. Dawkins wrote, I think in ‘The God Delusion’, but perhaps in one of his earlier books, that “only Science can provide us with reliable knowledge”.
This elevates Science way beyond its strictly limited range into a fundamental belief system.
Dawkins is like a starving man in a desert saying that ‘there is no such thing as food’ and thinking he has solved the problem.
Scientism is a form of fundamentalism. ‘Only Science’. This is nonsense of course. Alister McGrath points out in ‘The Dawkins Delusion’ (a book you must read if you read any of Dawkins’ books) that this statement that only Science can provide reliable knowledge cannot itself be tested scientifically. End of Dawkins. Well, not quite.
Like other Fundamentalists, Richard Dawkins’ beliefs are passionate and not based on clear
philosophical thinking. We should have little difficulty in rejecting scientism. There is more to
life than molecules. Fundamentalism can be defined as the belief that part of the truth is the
whole truth.
The second heresy is similar – Reductionism, sometimes called ‘nothing butt-ery’. You will
have heard some scientists suggest that we are ‘nothing but the cells we are made of’, ‘the
brain is only a mass of neurons’ or the Universe is ‘nothing but a vast mass of subatomic
particles’. The important point that I want to make here is that the whole is always, in nature,
more than the sum of its parts. Always. Always.
Take your bicycle to pieces and lay them on the ground. These are the parts of which it is
made, yes. But the parts on the ground are quite useless. Put them together and you have
something different and useful. Obvious really.
The third heresy concerns ‘chance’. We sometimes hear that evolution is a matter of
‘pure chance’. In fact there is no such thing as ‘pure chance’ in nature. Chance in nature is
always ‘a mechanism acting within a context’. I sometimes use the example of chasing a
chicken towards a fence which has just one escape hole in it. It will panic and run into the
fence again and again until by ‘chance’ it gets through the hole. A dog, being more intelligent
will look quickly up and down the fence and then dive through the hole. Many processes in
nature are ‘chicken like’, but they are not pure chance. The chicken’s behaviour can be said to be a mechanism (in this for solving the problem of escape) within a structure (in this case the fence with a hole in it) The idea of ‘pure chance’ in nature, like that of reductionism, is bad science.
I want to add something about the Arts here because I think they offer an interesting balance to the influence of Science in our thinking. You will see that it is relevant to our beliefs (faith?).
The Arts are essentially ‘holistic’. You do not hear of anyone saying that Rembrandt’s ‘Night Watch’ is ‘nothing but’ a mixture of pigments on a piece of canvas! Why not? Partly, no doubt, because we have always known, in this sense, about how pictures are painted. It is nothing new. By contrast the discovery by scientist of the bits we are made of is new, even startling. But it is more about the nature of art. It is the whole picture that counts. Of course a critic will analyse the picture, point out some of the details, say why he or she thinks it is so effective, tell us its history. But it is the whole picture, whole symphony, whole statue, that affects us. The fact is that reductionism and materialism are not really relevant in this area. The same is true of our religious beliefs.
So I am coming round to how Christians should respond to Modern Science. The first thing to remember is that we have been here before. This is not the first time that this sort of thing has happened. Augustine of Hippo pointed out in the 5th Century AD that Genesis 1 could not be taken literally. How can you have days and nights he said, when there is no sun and earth? He got away with that. But when Galileo, nearly 400 years ago, proposed that the earth rotated round the sun and not vice versa, he was lucky to escape with his life. The Church opposed his views vigorously and in those days it was the Church which was in power. Clearly some Christians felt that their faith was threatened. But which of us worries about that now? We have got used to the idea and have found that it does not affect our basic faith. My guess is that all this fuss over evolution will pass in due course. Meanwhile we have to clear our minds.
One option for us is to follow the ‘Young earth creationists’ and to dismiss the theory of evolution as simply wrong. It would not be an easy thing for us to do. What surprises
me is that quite a number of people, especially for some reason in the USA really do take
creationism very seriously. The movement even seems to be growing. Why? Well, there is a great satisfaction in simplicity. Just forget about Science and accept the literal truth of the Genesis story. Fundamentalism is attractive. Switch off your brain and relax. Another question:
Why is creationism popular now? Can it be that the literalism which is an essential part
of Science has influenced the literalism of Christian Fundamentalists? They would not be
pleased to hear this.
Although we may strongly disagree with Creationists we must respect their views.
They are often very devout Christians and that is what really matters.
I have not mentioned other faiths this evening. We know that Fundamentalism can be
very dangerous whatever your faith. It is particularly so when religious Fundamentalism is
linked with politics. Think of the Crusades. But I am not pursuing these thoughts this
evening.
What about Intelligent Design? Advocates of Intelligent Design tend to accept the age
of the universe but claim that the Evolutionary theory is incomplete (which it is) and unreliable (which, essentially, it is not). They point to parts of the theory which they say
do not ‘hold up’ and claim that therefore, God must have directly intervened at various
points in time. It might be easy to be attracted to this idea, especially if you are not a
scientist. But I have to tell you that the supposed ‘Science’ (I put the word in inverted
commas) quoted by enthusiasts for this view is bad science. Sadly, they seem to allow
their enthusiasm to run away with them. I do not recommend that you allow yourself to
be misled. Bad Science is always liable to be overcome by Better Science. Their case will
fail.
So how should Christians respond to the theory of Evolution? I suggest that we should
rejoice. Rejoice that God has given us the intelligence to seek to understand how His
universe works. We have learnt that His creation was not conjured up by a ‘flick of his
finger’, but rather by billions of years of painful as well as beautiful creativity. We find that
it is vastly more complex than we could ever have imagined. And yet the problems remain.
Some of these problems will perhaps never be understood as we cannot truly and fully know the
mind of God. Evolution is a bumpy ride, but it gets there.
Just as we experience pain and suffering as well as beauty and joy in our present lives, so we
find that pain as well as beauty is present in the process of evolution. This pain challenges us.
How can a loving God also allow it, apparently as a fundamental part of the creative process.
It is a problem which will not go away. I recommend Christopher Southgate’s recent book
‘The Groaning of Creation’.
There is a cost to evolution, as there is a cost in everything we humans create. Why?
We have no real answer. It is just there.
As far as our faith as Christians is concerned, we should be unaffected by, rather we should be enriched by, the progress of Science when it is properly understood. ‘In the beginning was
the word. And the word was with God, and the word was God’. The teaching of Jesus is in no way effected by Science. We should love God and love our neighbour as ourselves. God is love. Science has nothing to say about this.
What do we make of the miracles or the resurrection? Seen superficially these may seem
to be events denied by Science. But remember that Science can only judge those events
based on reproducible evidence. There is no way that we can do experiments on the
Resurrection. It was and is a unique event. There is evidence for it yes, in our lives and
in the history of the Church. But it is in no way reproducible in the way that evidence for
scientific theories has to be. Belief in the Resurrection is a matter of faith not of Science.
The matter of miracles is similar, but different. Faith healing is well recognised but
again outside the realm of experiment. Evidence is there but it cannot be reproduced in
the laboratory. I have known examples of faith healing as I expect many of you have.
Remember that even Jesus could not heal where there was no faith. We should avoid
falling into the trap of thinking that something we do not understand does not exist.
Mystery will always be an essential part of our faith.
Personally I am a firm believer in the power of prayer. Prayer changes us as well as
those we pray for. It changes relationships. I know someone whom many of us prayed
for when he was very seriously ill. He was never told that we were praying for him but
when he recovered he said that he had felt those prayers. We do not understand how faith
healing works, but it certainly does happen and some doctors recognise this.
I think that it is time to move towards discussion. Let me just sum up some of the
points I have made. This does not mean that we should not discuss any other relevant points. There is a great deal I have not said.
I have asked ‘what is Science?’ and have discussed the importance of reproducible evidence and the way in which, by contrast, the theories which ‘explain’ that evidence are constantly changing.
I have talked about the theory of Evolution and the way that massive evidence, much of it observed since Darwin’s time, supports it as a general thesis. But I have warned you that there is still a great deal about the way life evolved that we do not understand.
I have recommended 2 books (among many others):
Denis Alexander ‘Creation and Evolution. Do we have to choose’?
Christopher Southgate ‘The Groaning of Creation. God, Evolution and the Problem of Evil’.
The Dawkins Delusion’ and indeed any other books by Alister McGrath.
I have spoken about Darwin himself and my great admiration for him. (Is it surprising that a man so obsessed by material evidence should become an agnostic?)
I have mentioned three ‘scientific heresies’ as I have called them:
Scientism (A form of Fundamentalism)
Reductionism. The whole is always more than the sum of the parts.
The role of chance in Science. Chance in nature is ‘A mechanism acting within a context’.
I have talked about the Arts as a way of taking a step away from Science towards
understanding the holistic nature of faith.
I have said something about past problems between Science and Christian faith.
Augustine, Galileo.
I was critical of Intelligent Design.
I suggested that we should rejoice in God’s creation, recognising the pain and
suffering which appear to be an essential part of the creative process.
Science is not a lion which is seeking to devour us. Properly understood science can enrich our lives. But, however science advances, it can never challenge our faith nor the teaching of Jesus, and, as he showed us, accept suffering, love God, love our neighbour as ourselves and know that God is love. This will never be changed. Never.
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Local vicar’s charity fund-raising trek in the Himalayas.
Rev Dr Richard Warden of St James’ Finchampstead is preparing for a challenging trek in the Himalayas, which will raise funds for the Parkinson’s Disease Society.
The charity is dear to the hearts of the Wardens after the loss of a close family member five years ago. “The PDS were very supportive”, said Richard, “and the trip is in memory of my father who contracted the disease when I was a small boy. He suffered from the disease for 40 years, during which time he underwent three brain operations. The trip will take place next April commencing in Parkinson’s Awareness Week, and the trek itself is planned to start on what would have been Dad’s birthday! Also, the PDS celebrates its 40th year in 2009. Unable to travel for much of his life, my father loved nature and the majesty of the mountains, so I shall go very conscious of my good fortune and good health. ”
Reverend Richard’s varied ministry includes Army Chaplaincy which took him to the conflict in Northern Ireland; Chaplain to Wycombe Abbey School and subsequently at Wellington College, Crowthorne; and currently as Priest-in-Charge at St James’ Church, Finchampstead. The trek also celebrates 25 years as a priest in the Church of England – something his father was proud of and instrumental in him becoming.
He will be giving details of the work of the charity, and information on the trek, to a gathering of parishioners on Saturday 6 December. “Both individual donations to PDS, and generous gifts from local companies towards the raffle in aid of the charity have been amazing”, said Reverend Richard. Donating organisations include: Ascot Racing Authority, The Restaurant Group (Bluebeckers), John Nike Leisure Centre, Coral Reef, The Lookout, ICI Paints, Tesco Stores (Martins Heron, Bracknell North and Wokingham), Morrisons, Waitrose Wokingham, Longacres.
Rev Richard Warden, pictured above with wife Penny.
For more information concerning this press release, please telephone
Reverend Richard at The Rectory, Finchampstead 0118 973 2102
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Andrew Bosley - LENT Talk - Tuesday 24th April 2009
I have to admit that when Revd Richard suggested I took part in this series of Lent lectures my first reaction was one of blind panic ! Not because I didn’t want to do it but probably because I hadn’t done it here before. I think the last time I did something like this was about 20 years ago when at St Peter’s Caversham. My “audience” was the Music Group of the University of the 3rd Age in Reading – a rather formidable group made up largely of retired professional musicians, many of them lecturers with connections with the music departments of two universities of and the BBC. To describe them as “erudite” was something of an understatement !! Anyway, I must have done something right because I lived to tell the tale and actually got invited back. So, here we are – 20 years on – this time in Finchampstead with, may I say, a much more friendly looking gathering. This evening I shall attempt to trace the development of music in worship from its beginnings to the present day. If I were to do justice to each period of development we would probably need a full session for each one rather than cramming the whole lot into the short time we have together this evening. So, it will be very much a “potted” history of church music development. Before I get going I’d like to thank Revd Richard for his invitation to speak tonight and all of you for coming. It’s a great honour and privilege to deliver this short talk – thank you. During this time there will be some opportunities for quiet reflection during which there will be some pieces of music played on CD to help us focus and reflect.
Before we go back into the mists of time, perhaps we should just think more generally for a little while about the role of music and its effect and influence on our worship. If we want our churches to be alive, our worship must be alive, and if we want our worship to be alive, our music must be alive. May I dare to suggest that most of us probably find that music – in whatever form – reaches and permeates our deepest feelings far more powerfully than words alone. It’s my guess ( and I’m probably just slightly biased) that few of us would really want to worship in a church where there was no music and if our experience of worship is boring it could be that we’ve probably experienced something sadly lacking in the music. Think, if you would, of festivals such as Christmas and Easter. Then try to imagine them without music ? In fact, music may well be the first thing that comes to mind when we think back on these high spots. Week by week, what makes you feel at home (or not at home as the case may be) as you worship in our church or visit a strange church, maybe when you’re on holiday. Chances are that the kind of music you hear and are asked to sing has a lot to do with how you feel. Music is something we both hear and sing when we worship. This is related to the fact that worship is, as I heard someone describe it once, both call and response. The call of God reaches the depths of our hearts and our music and singing etc expresses the deepest response of our hearts to God. If we recognize the importance of music we do not detract from the centrality of Word and Sacrament – on the contrary, music adds immeasurably to the power of Scripture and preaching, prayer and Sacrament. This was beautifully summed up by a former incumbent of a previous church of mine when he described music as “The Bicycle of the Liturgy”. It could also be described as the “Bicycle of Scripture” - we not only hear it read in our worship we also hear it sung. It could be said that setting the long succession of bible verses to music in Handel’s masterpiece “The Messiah” have made those passages of scripture virtually unforgettable. Most of the anthems sung by our choir are settings of scripture. Don’t forget the psalms and the canticles – still sung at St James’ at Matins and Evensong. Finally, one of the most powerful hymns we sing – “Tell out my soul”. At St James’ we are blessed with gifted and effective preachers who regularly challenge us every Sunday – I’m sure that the effectiveness of their sermons and addresses would be just slightly compromised if not complimented by a hymn of preparation beforehand and followed by a hymn of response, as is the case at Matins and Evensong. Wasn’t it St Augustine who told us that “when we sing we pray twice”. Rarely does a congregation pray so powerfully as when they are singing great hymns of prayer such as “Breathe on me breath of God” or “Spirit of the Living God, fall afresh on me”. The inherent power of the sacraments is also brought out by music. Think how much some meaningful and carefully chosen hymns add to a service of Marriage or Baptism. What a difference it makes at The Eucharist when choir and congregation offer anthems, hymns and chants during the administration of Holy Communion. How much more meaningful the acclamations in the ritual are when sung by everyone to a good musical setting rather than just read “parrot-fasion” or sung by a few brave souls up in a remote organ loft in some strange and, all too often, outdated musical style. I feel passionately that the music has a positive bearing on how everything else in the services go. When the music is uplifting the ministers and all who help lead the worship are in turn inspired to preach with a far greater power and conviction, while those in the pews find their hearts and minds opened even wider to hear more clearly and receive more fully the good news of the Gospel. I’m also convinced that when we leave the shelter of our church building to go about our daily lives we do so with more God-given power if there is music echoing in our hearts and a hymn tune on our lips !
CD Breathe on me, breath of God (Darlene Zschech)
So, let’s turn to the development of music in the worship of the Church. How did we come to be where we are now ? In order to trace this development, we need to return to the early church and work back. It might be worth bearing in mind also that the church building that stands over there – our beloved church of St James, Finchampstead – has proudly stood on that spot bearing witness to most of the different periods we’ll be thinking about this evening.
Throughout the years, church music has changed immensely, continually producing new forms of worship and new opinions on how we should worship God. Beginning in the Middle Ages and ending up in the 21st Century, music has kept abreast of changing times and changing attitudes. European church music during the middle ages was sung in Latin and was known as Plainsong. There were several forms of Plainsong but the most popular was known as Gregorian Chant, and such was its popularity that it stayed in constant use throughout this long period and paved the way for other types of music. Gregorian Chant developed mainly in western and central Europe during the 9th and 10th Centuries. Many people believed an old story which says that Pope Gregory the Great wrote the songs and this new form of plainsong. Most people who study the history of music believe that kings such as Charlemagne brought this music from Rome to their kingdoms in France and Germany. This music became known as Gregorian Chant (after Pope Gregory) and it gradually replaced much of what could best be described as “local” music throughout Europe. Although the Roman Catholic Church no longer requires its people to sing Gregorian Chants it still says that Gregorian Chant is the best music for prayer. Sadly, this method of chanting is rarely heard in the Roman Catholic Church now – except perhaps in places like Westminster Cathedral or Brompton Oratory or maybe some of its Monastic Institutions such as Ampleforth or Douai. It might sound strange but you’re more likely to hear Gregorian Chant nowadays in the more extreme Anglo-Catholic wing of the Church of England – even then, you have to know where to find it.
So, Christians have been singing songs and Psalms since the earliest days of the Church. Let’s think for a few minutes about the Psalms. Until fairly recently many people believed that the Jewish songs called the Psalms which are common to both Jewish and Christian traditions, were an important part of early Christian music and prayer. Students of the history of religious music no longer believe this, because many early Christian songs were not from the Psalms and Jews did not sing Psalms for many centuries after their most important holy place, the second temple, was destroyed in the year 70 (??) However, some parts of Jewish Music and Prayer somehow ended up later in Gregorian Chant. The organised order of prayers called “canonical hours” come from the Jewish tradition. The words Amen and Alleluia are from the Hebrew and the prayer “Sanctus, Sanctus, Sanctus” which means “Holy Holy Holy” comes from the Jewish prayer “kadosh kadosh kadosh”. It goes to show how much we have in common with the Jewish tradition, also it highlights how ancient the roots of our music tradition are. However, these days we are more likely to hear the psalms sung to Anglican Chant – as is our custom here at St James’. Anglican Chant is a method of singing un-metrical texts such a prose translations of the psalms, canticles or similar biblical texts by matching the natural speech rhythm of the words in each verse to a short piece of metrical music. Anglican Chant was developed in England at the time of the Reformation and appears to be an adaptation of the plainchant method and by the 18th Century was well established. The earliest known examples are single chants (chants written to cover just one verse of the text) and some of these date from the latter part of the 16th Century, many written by Thomas Tallis and his contemporaries, so it seems likely that Anglican Chant was devised by them to provide suitable musical settings for the English language version of the Psalter translated by Coverdale, as published in the then new Book of Common Prayer. The earliest double chants are from about 1700 – these are chants written to cover 2 verses of texts (such as the Magnificat at Evensong) and even one or two quadruple chants written to cover 4 verses of text – those of you who come to Matins will remember that we occasionally use a quadruple chant for the Te Deum.
CD Psalm 84
So now we enter the 16th Century, during which came the Reformation. At the time of the Reformation the reformers wanted services to the conducted in the vernacular. They also insisted on hymns which could be understood and sung b y the people, and they wanted to get away from plainchant, most of which could only be performed by monks. The reformers also demanded that the new hymns should have a strictly scriptural basis, so they began to introduce metrical versions of the psalms – where the psalms were given a rhyme and rhythm, and verse structure, making them easy to sing and be understood. Take “The Lord’s my Shepherd” for example. In doing so they began the divide between psalms and hymns which caused so much controversy in the Anglican church later on in the 18th and 19th Centuries. The Reformation coincided with the groundbreaking introduction of printing and this gave churchgoers even greater access to vernacular hymns. Martin Luther made a huge impact on the Church and its music, particularly in the development of accessible hymnody. No only was he a radical theologian and a fine musician, he also encouraged many with musical talent to use it for the glory of God. As well as influencing others, he himself wrote many hymns and rewrote former Gregorian chants to encourage better congregational singing. Many of Luther’s hymns are still sung today – probably the finest example is “A safe stronghold our God is still” (based on Psalm 46) sung to his stirring tune “Ein Feste Burg”. Many critics have claimed that Luther wrote hymns patterned after bar songs sung in taverns, but this is simply not true. Luther wrote many hymns in a medieval form called bar tune which was a pattern of stanzas for poetry writing; however, this had been misunderstood and misinterpreted as, quite literally, drinking songs ! Although Luther did indeed use this method of bar tune or bar form, the suggestion that his hymns were inspired by lewd drinking songs is pure falsehood !! The Reformation was to open the way for contributions from composers such as J S Bach, but sadly, the church in this country had first to recover from a serious setback in its musical development whilst under the influence of Oliver Cromwell and the Puritans. Churches and Cathedrals were vandalised - stripped of all decoration, colour and any embellishments which could have been described as idolatrous. The music of the Church of England was restricted to a staple diet of plain unison psalm tunes, sung unaccompanied, painfully slowly and unrhythmically by apathetic congregations. Apparently the rest of the service was equally irreverent: some churches had to employ a dog catcher to stop them disrupting services and men would leave their hats on the Altar and in the Font. Hymns, with their vague scriptural references were still frowned upon. However, the average worshippers of the period were becoming increasingly dissatisfied with metrical psalms because their texts were not of the rhetorical quality of the Book of Common Prayer and many were extremely poor adaptations of scripture.
CD A nata lux de lumine (Thomas Tallis)
It was the great ISAAC WATTS who began the early 18th Century reform of congregational singing in the Church of England. He wrote many fine hymns – Joy to the world, Come let us join our cheerful songs and When I survey the wondrous cross are just three examples – and started from the principles that texts should express the religious feelings of the people. This was a complete turnaround from the previously held view that they should be scripturally based. Isaac Watts’ principle still holds today, with the editorial committees of at least two hymnbooks still guided by that principle.
Now we’re getting near to the “coming of age” of English hymn writing. It was the Wesley brothers, John and Charles who, early in the 18th Century and almost contemporary with Isaac Watts, set out to change worshippers’ views of hymnody. They were not only the founders of Methodism but they insisted that hymns – both words and music – should be written to STIR the congregation, reinforce its religious emotions and play on the “feel-good” factor. The Wesleys made hymn singing the central feature of Methodist worship and it wasn’t long before many people began to admire the Methodists for their hearty and fervent singing. (I can identify with that, being a Methodist in my childhood.) The qualities of sincerity and conviction were a vital part of the Wesley approach and congregations responded with vigour and enthusiasm. So powerful was this surge that many were attracted away from the Church of England into Methodism. I think it’s safe to say that the biggist exodus was probably in the west country – Cornwall in particular. A number of forward looking Anglican clergymen began to see the need for a similar musical revival in their own Church. But many Anglicans resisted the introduction of the more evangelical style hymns because they were still wedded to (and entrenched in) the use of the metrical psalm – the musical embodiment of scripture. The matter came to a head in Sheffield in 1819 when the Vicar – Revd Thomas Cotterill – imposed Methodist style hymns on his congregation, who promptly rebelled and took him to the Diocesan Consistory Court. The case was heard by the Chancellor of the Diocese of York who, in a typical Anglican compromise, concluded that both hymns and metrical psalms were illegal in Anglican liturgy BUT, because their use was so widespread, he didn’t feel able to enforce his decision !! This, of course, opened the floodgates to all manner of hymns – including Gospel songs – and, coupled with the pioneering work of Watts, Charles and John Wesley and other 19th century hymn writers and composers too numerous to mention, laid the foundation of Anglican hymnody as we know it today.
The other great impetus was the publication in 1861 of Hymns Ancient and Modern. Its enlightened editorial committee insisted that it should reflect the very best of the many traditions of hymnody. It was an amazing success – sales reached 500,000 annually (at a time when many people still couldn’t read or write) and by 1912 it had sold a staggering sixty million copies – it’s still in print today – despite its revision in 1950, the publication of A&M New Standard which incorporates the 200 “hymns for today” and more recently, Common Praise.
We’re now going to listen to one of the great Victorian hymns – “Praise my soul, the King of heaven”
CD Praise my soul, the King of heaven
Up to the middle of the 19th Century many churches, particularly in rural areas, did not have organs and still relied on the services of the Village Band to provide accompaniment for the singing of hymns etc. This was known as “West Gallery Music”. If you look closely at the west end of the nave of St James’ church you will see evidence of a west gallery – this is where the band and the singers would have played and sung from during services. The band generally consisted of whatever instruments and voices happened to be available – maybe a string bass or cello, a bassoon, fiddles and violins and perhaps an accordion. However, by about the middle of the 19th Century the old church and chapel music was gradually becoming forgotten, not necessarily because its musical quality was poor but because its style no longer fitted in with the religious ideals of the period – this demise can also be linked to changes in society as well as religion. Non conformity flourished in the fast growing towns of the industrial revolution as chapels could be built wherever they were needed, whereas new Anglican Parish Churches required an Act of Parliament. Then along came the Oxford Movement and as its influence spread, country church music became increasingly conventional and correct – bands were replaced by organs, harmoniums or sometimes even barrel organs and the gallery choirs made way for all-male choirs placed in the chancel, under the watchful eye of the clergy. So, now we’ve arrived at the start of the 20th Century we have seen a freedom of style develop in what history calls the Liturgical Movement. We have also seen the transformation of church music to suit changing and evolving congregations. Sadly, it’s not surprising that, in terms of church music development, the first fifty-odd years of that troubled and violent century yielded comparatively little. Music in Anglican worship continued relatively unchanged – many “low” and “middle of the road” churches had adopted the services of Matins and Evensong whilst the Eucharist was the staple diet of the more Catholic wing of the Church and it is more than likely that, unless a church had a particularly fine music tradition which could support the use of ornate musical settings by composers such as Mozart and Haydn, you would find the service sung to the setting by Merbecke. The Parish Communion as we know it, had not yet arrived! Despite there being something of a dearth of new parish music at this time, there were two composers whose contributions to Church Music were beginning to “buck the trend”. Ralph Vaughan Williams was one and the other was Martin Shaw. Both men warrant more time devoted to them in this lecture than I am able to give tonight. Briefly, Vaughan Williams was editor of the “English Hymnal” created by Revd Percy Dearmer in 1906. Vaughan Williams also composed several hymn tunes, the most notable being the fine tune to “For all the Saints”. Martin Shaw, who had assisted Vaughan Williams in his research for the English Hymnal, had been organist of the famous north London church of St Mary, Primrose Hill where Father Dearmer was Vicar. Apart from his hymn tunes such as those written for “Hills of the north rejoice” and “Through the night of doubt and sorrow”, Shaw is probably best known for his “Anglican Folk Mass” which had the distinction of being the only alternative to Merbecke’s setting that we can say was widely known everywhere in England. Indeed, it is still used in some churches to this day.
During the post-war years and into the 1950’s changes which were to change the face of Church music were about to emerge. In the late 1950s The Revd Patrick Appleford was Vicar of a rather “down at heel” church in East London. Father Appleford was also an accomplished musician and, identifying the need for even more accessible and up-to-date music in his own Parish and finding nothing suitable in the Christian music market, he set about rectifying the situation by writing his own. He began in a very small way with a simple hymn for which he wrote the words and music in the then modern idiom. The year was 1960 and the name of the hymn was “Living Lord”. Can you believe that this was written nearly 50 years ago ?? Appleford continued to write hymn tunes etc for the church and his Communion setting, written for the Series 3 Communion service is still widely used and as popular as it was when it was first written – in fact it has just been revised for use with the Common Worship Communion services. Others grasped the mettle and began composing hymn tunes and other pieces but much of their work has been lost in the mists of time, simply because they wrote new tunes to traditional hymns. Little of their work survives – probably the most popular hymn tune from that period is “Camberwell” – written to be sung to “At the name of Jesus” and “Hatherop Castle” – written for “O Jesus I have promised”, popular in schools but not so popular outside the School Assembly Hall ! These two survived but some less successful compositions to go with “Firmly I believe and truly”, “Angel voices” and “Lord thy word abideth” (to name but three) seem to have disappeared without trace. Father Appleford had the advantage right from the start because he had the courage to write new music with new lyrics.
So, while Father Appleford was busy composing, other things were going on. Parish Communions and Family Communions had arrived with chancels and sanctuaries the length and breadth of the country being re-ordered so that Altars could be moved within sight of the congregations so that they could actually see what was going on. The wider Church was placing particular emphasis on reaching out to young people. Christian Unions within universities hosted evangelistic talks and provided Bible teaching for their members. Christian cafes opened and church youth groups were being set up. Some Christians felt that the Church needed to break from its stereotype as being formal and dull in order to appeal to the younger generation. Using popular music the Church restated the claims of the Bible through Christian lyrics, thus sending the message that Christianity was not outdated or irrelevant. Who remembers the Joystrings ? Led by Joy Webb of the Salvation Army they were one of the first Christian pop groups to appear on television, in Salvation Army uniform, playing what was then Christian Pop Music. Since then much modern Christian rock and pop has developed and there is a thriving Christian Music business right across the world. Gradually amateur groups developed from church youth groups, also playing Christian music in the popular idiom, and as they did so many churches began to include their songs and their style in corporate worship. These early songs for communal singing were arguably the first examples of contemporary worship music and were characteristically simple, often using only the first three chords of the twelve bar blues in a repetitive pattern, well-suited for guitar strumming! “Youth Praise” published in 1966 was one of the first and most famous collection of these songs.
These foundations laid by those pioneers of Church music revival have formed the base on which their successors have continued to provide us with such a wonderful variety of good church music which has, rightly, found its way into our repertoires. The music of Billy Graham’s “Mission England” in the early 1980s played no small part in the furthering of this. From Mission England emerged what I still regard as one of the best hymnbooks to be published in the 20th Century - “Mission Praise”. From small beginnings (282 hymns and songs) and after no less than five revisions, this publication has mushroomed and offers over 1000 hymns and songs in one publication. Because of Patrick Appleford’s initiatives in the 1960s we in the Church of England are now blessed with more music settings of the Eucharist than we could ever hope to use, with settings by Dom Gregory Murray, Richard Shepherd, Martin How and not forgetting the works of David Thorne and Malcolm Archer which we use regularly here at St James’, and more are still being written – a far cry from the days when, in a country church you had the choice of Merbecke, Merbecke or even Merbecke !! Back on the hymn front the works of Timothy Dudley-Smith (former Bishop of Thetford) and Michael Baughen (former Bishop of Chester) have also found their way into our churches through Mission Praise and other hymn books such as we use here, with such hymns as “Christ triumphant, ever reigning”, “Tell out my soul”, “Lord for the years” and “Sing to God new songs of worship” now occupying pride of place in our music repertoires, as is the work of Graham Kendrick. Graham began his songwriting career in the late 1960s. his most enduring accomplishment is his words and music for the song “Shine, Jesus shine” which has to be among the most widely heard songs in contemporary Christian worship worldwide. His other songs – which include “The Servant King” and “Meekness and majesty” have become well loved and widely used by worshippers in this country. Although now best known as a worship leader and writer of worship songs, Graham began his career as a member of a Christian band “Whispers of truth”. Later he began working as a solo concert performer and recording artist in the Christian tradition. He worked for a time as a member of “In the name of Jesus” the ground-breaking mission team led by Revd Clive Calver. Calver went on to run British Youth for Christ and Evangelical Alliance before leaving the UK to do similar work in America. Graham Kendrick, however, has remained firmly fixed in the UK church as probably the most influential Christian songwriter of his generation. Graham is not quite so heavily involved at the sharp end of Christian music these days, but again, the foundations he has laid have been built on by other Christian musicians who are continuing this great work. People like Darlene Zschech, who we heard earlier in one of our reflection periods. Darlene is music pastor at the Hillsong Church just outside Sydney and is a major contributor to the Charismatic music scene. So far, we have only used one of her songs at St James’ and this is one that occupies a very special place in the hearts of our junior choristers. The song is “Shout to the Lord” – you may remember it.
CD Shout to the Lord
The music of two Christian communities have also had a deep and lasting influence on the development of church music in this country, not least at Finchampstead. I refer, of course, to the communities at Iona and Taize. Iona is situated in the inner Hebrides. The Iona community, founded in 1938, is an ecumenical community of people of all ages and from different walks of life and Christian traditions.They are committed to seeking new ways of living the Gospel of Jesus in the world today. The community is a leading force in the present Celtic Christianity revival. Several Scottish kings are buried at Iona Abbey, as is John Smith, the former Labour party leader. Our Youth group has visited Iona, and their visit left a lasting impression on their lives. The Taize community in France is an ecumenical Christian monastic order, comprising a little over 100 brothers who come from Catholic, Orthodox and Protestant traditions. It has a interesting history. Brother Roger, the founder of the community, first purchased a house in Taize in 1940 and, being situated only a short distance south of the separation line that divided war-torn France, it became a sanctuary to countless war refugees seeking shelter from the Nazis. However, whilst on a trip to Switzerland to raise money for his refuge fund, the house was occupied by the Gestapo and Roger was not able to return there until the liberation of France in 1944. The rest of the Taize story is, as they say, history and Taize had evolved to become the internationally renowned centre of pilgrimage that we know today. Sadly, Brother Roger was murdered whilst at prayer at Taize in August 2005 at the age of 90. His memorial is the community, and what a legacy he has left. Taize has been a place of pilgrimage to members of our community here at St James on several occasions in recent years and its music is used here on occasions. Taize and Iona have one thing in common – their music is unique. As we approach Passiontide it is appropriate that we sing one of the seasonal Taize chants together now. The words and music are, in the spirit of Taize, simple. They are the words of the penitent thief – “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” Let’s sing it together now – if any choir members are here you might like to harmonize.
JESUS, REMEMBER ME
As we approach the end of this evening’s talk we have arrived back in the 21st century and Christian music writers are still “about the Lord’s business”. This evening we seem to have gone full circle – remember I began by talking about the Psalms. Our penultimate CD track this evening features a new version of Psalm 23 by a young man Stuart Townend. We’ve used this once before at St James and it will definitely be back – sooner rather than later I hope. Stuart Townend, like Graham Kendrick, is a British Christian worship leader and writer of contemporary worship music. His songs include “In Christ alone”, “How deep the Father’s love for us” and “Beautiful Saviour”- some of you may just have come across these. Stuart is the son of a Church of England Vicar in Halifix, West Yorkshire. He started playing the piano at the age of 7 – at 13 he made a Christian commitment and began songwriting at the age of 22. The Christian website “Crosstalk” commented that “the uniqueness of Stuart Townend’s writing lies partly in its lyrical content. There is both theological depth and poetic expression that some say is rare in today’s worship writing”. I’m convinced that we are going to hear much more of this young man and it’s my prayer that the best of his music will, eventually, find its way into our repertoire here at St James’. Here is “The Lord’s my Shepherd”.
CD The Lord’s my Shepherd
Finally, a postscript. I hope you’ll forgive me for ending on a slightly more personal note. I’d just like to share with you an experience I had about 15 years ago which turned out to be the most profound and beautiful musical experience of my life. During a year’s sabbatical in 1994 I was on pilgrimage at the Abbey House in Glastonbury. Each day began with the daily Eucharist either in the Abbey House Chapel or (as was the case on this particular morning) in the small and ancient chapel of St Patrick which stands in a quiet corner of the Abbey grounds in Glastonbury. The weather had been fantastic and this morning was no exception. The service began at 7-00 am celebrated very simply by the Vicar of Glastonbury in this plain and simple chapel. At the moment of consecration as the host was elevated we became aware of the most beautiful music being sung close to the chapel, the sound wafting gently in through the open door. I have found a recording of this music and would like to share it with you now as we close this evening’s talk.
CD (Birdsong – Blackbird)
Finally, a short passage from Colossians 3 : 16 “Let the word of Christ richly dwell within you with all wisdom teaching and admonishing one another with psalms and hymns and spiritual songs singing with thankfulness in your hearts to God.” (and that, my friends, includes the blackbird !!)
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PARISH SHARE
Diocese of Oxford / Deanery of Sonning
Parish of St James' Finchampstead
St James’ Parish Share for 2008 is: £79,091
The Parish Share is the method used of inviting Parishes to help fund the cost of the running both the Diocese and the Deanery activities.
It is a very important part of our spiritual giving and the allocation of the Parish Share from the Deanery is ‘shared’ by all Parishes in the Deanery based on their ability to pay, associated with various factors such as; Size of the Electoral Roll, Church Attendance, Stipendiary Posts and PCC Income. Thus busy active Churches will be asked to pay more and other newer or struggling Churches will be asked to pay less.
DIOCESE OF OXFORD - SONNING DEANERY |
|
Provisional Parish Shares for 2009 |
|
Parishes |
Share (£) |
Arborfield |
£33,294.00 |
Barkham |
£31,891.00 |
White House |
£9,536.00 |
Bearwood |
£25,975.00 |
California |
£42,361.00 |
Crowthorne |
£77,108.00 |
Finchampstead |
£77,608.00 |
Hurst & Winnersh |
£48,325.00 |
Owlsmoor |
£36,260.00 |
Ruscombe & Twyford |
£77,485.00 |
Sandhurst |
£93,376.00 |
Sonning |
£97,864.00 |
Wargrave with Knowl Hill |
£100,276.00 |
Wokingham, All Saints |
£122,902.00 |
Wokingham, St. Paul |
£82,587.00 |
St. Sebastian |
£68,659.00 |
Woosehill |
£21,641.00 |
Deanery Total |
£1,047,148.00 |
St James’ Parish Share for 2009 is: £77,608.00
A very sizeable sum equivalent to £6,467 per month or £1,493 per week
{or even; £212 per day!!!!!!}
Ed Sampson, Treasurer
August 2008
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Report - LAMBETH CONFERENCE August 2008
From the Bishop of Oxford
Dear Colleague,
The Lambeth Conference is over - but in a sense its work now begins, as the bishops fan out all over the world and get to work. I wanted to report back in a personal way, realising that there have been, and will be, lots of other 'takes' on the conference. Some of the national press reporting has, as expected, been alarmist and inaccurate ('Is this the end of the Communion?' 'Communion in meltdown'). The Conference has in fact been as successful as it could be, given the circumstances.
As I see it, the conference successfully navigated the 'chicane' which, in slippery conditions, could have led to a multiple-car pile-up. The bishops emerged determined to do all we can to hold the Anglican Communion together based on enriched friendships, progress towards an Anglican Covenant, and a moratorium on the divisive actions that have been threatening the unity of the Communion.
All of this was based on the firm foundation of a two-day retreat led by Archbishop Rowan in Canterbury Cathedral. Throughout the conference +Rowan was magnificent. He balanced theological and spiritual depth with personal humility and wise, strong leadership. His energy was extraordinary. He was omni-present without being dominant; he simply made of himself a gift to us all, offering a safe, steady canopy of wisdom and prayerfulness.
The experience, the stories
Lambeth was an exhausting experience. Days and nights were packed with worship, Bible study, 'Indaba' groups, plenary meetings, self-select sessions, hearings, fringe events, and special meetings of all shapes and sizes. Alongside all this was the emotional stimulus of engaging in scores of conversations with brother and sister bishops from such varied contexts that sometimes we seemed to come from different planets, but all held by our love for Jesus Christ and for the unique family we call 'the Anglican Communion'.
It was very moving, for example, to talk to bishops who had not an inch of tarmac in their whole diocese and who travel by foot over mountain ranges to reach their outstations, or by canoe from island to island, or by plane piloted by their wife! We heard from a bishop who has no stipend and is supported by his children; an archbishop who has the diocesan office in his front room; and a bishop who has 30 priests spread across a diocese the size of France, Spain and Italy put together. The work some of these bishops and their extraordinary wives do in setting up orphanages, AIDs programmes, schools, primary health care facilities and so on, is humbling.
The issues
It was exhilarating to take part in the walk of witness past the Houses of Parliament urging implementation of the Millennium Development Goals and to hear the Prime Minister in passionate form about these morally compelling objectives. Plenary sessions on climate change, domestic violence, and mission in a new social paradigm were equally stimulating.
The bulk of the heavyweight work was done in the 'indaba' groups made up of five bible study groups (and therefore 40 people) working on the African model of purposeful discussion on common concerns. It was a listening process by which corporate wisdom emerged and was offered to the Reflections Group which, through an iterative process, produced the final document, which isn't a report or a statement or a communiqué, but a paper capturing the conversations and reflections of the Conference. The areas covered in the indaba groups were mission and evangelism, social justice, the environment, ecumenism, dialogue with other world faiths, scripture, human sexuality, and the Anglican Covenant.
There was welcome affirmation of the central importance of sharing God's good news, and of personal transformation spilling over into the redemption of all creation. The importance of the fifth mark of mission on sustaining and renewing the life of the earth was a strong theme. There was huge support for us from ecumenical participants eager to help us sustain our unity. There was a proper call for respectful dialogue with other faiths which involves no diminution of commitment to the uniqueness of Christ.
Human sexuality
Some of us felt we would be rushed to deal with both human sexuality and the covenant in the last two days of the conference, and so we were. Nevertheless there was a good airing of the issues and some inching forward. We didn't agree across the Communion on homosexuality (how would we?!) but we listened well to each other and heard the pain on both sides of the argument. I think there was more understanding amongst the American bishops of the angst caused by their actions. There was recognition of the missional problems caused for some to be known as the 'gay church', and for others to be seen as so far behind the line in respecting human rights. It was good to hear a common view of the authority of scripture. My own view remains that we need to hold together in respectful and prayerful dialogue, under scripture, remembering that it took the Communion 100 years to sort out its approach to polygamy, 50 years on contraception and 40 years on the marriage of divorced people.
Anglican Covenant
To help in this process we have the prospect of an Anglican Covenant which received stronger affirmation than I had thought it might. Any Covenant would be rooted in God's covenant with us, and would be intended to heal present wounds and prevent new ones. It would be relational but costly and self-limiting for those with strongly opposed positions. It would take us back to our common roots in Anglicanism, our commitment to scripture interpreted through tradition and reason, our Lambeth Quadrilateral, our focus on mission, and many other good things. The difficulty remains in the final part of the Covenant, and in the appendix, where details are spelled out of a possible way of handling disputes. More work needs to be done here to avoid an aura of punishment while still preventing the fabric of communion tearing further. I don't envy the task of the Covenant Design Group but I do believe they are to be trusted.
Windsor process
What's needed to under-write the Covenant is the further implementation of what's known as the Windsor Process. Again there was much endorsement of the process, along with some anxiety about commitment to it. Crucially, there was support for three moratoria:
Without these it will be very hard to move forward. Secondly there will be a Pastoral Forum which can come into action quickly in a situation of dispute, and thirdly the four Instruments of Communion (the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Lambeth Conference, the Anglican Consultative Council, and the Primates' Meeting) will need to have their roles and relationships clarified to avoid the confusions and distrust of recent years.
What now?
Of course there are real concerns. Mine centre on whether the Gafcon bishops and leaders will be prepared to engage with the re-affirmed Covenant and Windsor Processes, and whether the American Church will hold to the moratoria. It was a huge impoverishment that the Gafcon bishops weren't all with us (though 80 were). We need all of us to be exercising gracious restraint and committing ourselves to affection, trust and goodwill towards each other and in particular to the Archbishop of Canterbury. But such 'affection, trust and goodwill' are surely at the heart of any Christ-like living. How can we not offer such gifts to each other?
This was a remarkable experience for all of your bishops. We were fully engaged and much inspired. Do talk to us, ask us anything. We will continue to report back. Bishop Colin did us proud as a key member of the Lambeth Design Group (the only English bishop on it). Please continue to pray that the Lambeth Conference will be received as a gift to the whole Communion as we all seek to live out our corporate discipleship together and to give glory to the One who gives us everything, Jesus Christ our Lord.
With all good wishes
+ John OXON
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