Ebor Lecture

Tue Sep 19 2006
Diary

I went to an Ebor lecture last week, at York Minster, by the Archbishop of York – John Sentamu. The title was Uncovering the Purposes of God, and he was really talking about the purposes of God through

  • trust and worship of a loving God
  • love for your neighbour
  • care for creation

There were two quotes in particular that stood out to me

  1. Faith is not a crutch to lean on, but the act of leaning, and
  2. Reason and human worth are core to our Christian culture in the UK

The second one was particularly in the context of wanting to rename Christmas Winterval – he said that it wasn’t having a Christian culture that offended, but the cynicism of politically correct people trying to deny it.

The other really good bit was the Chocolate Trinity – Cadbury, Rowntree, and Fry – three Quakers who essentially were the UK Chocolate industry in the 18th,19th, and start of the 20th centuries. A quick Google gives me Quaker food. I’m a died in the wool protestant, and so disagree with some of the principles and beliefs of the Friends Movement, but clearly the principles and ethics are basically Christian.