27 April 2009 No Comment

What if…..all faith/not sure of faith/non faith dialogue was carried out like this passage (easy tiger- it will be cited soon). I’ve cited Billy Bragg before and in my 43 and a bit years on this planet I’ve seen him 3 times (once with ‘Red Wedge’- happy days- with special suprise guests ‘The Smiths’. Even as I write those words, it was if I have died and gone to heaven). I always have liked his music and increasingly I find him really insightful in how to grow old and maintain a radical perspective. I don’t know where he stands on faith- agnostic/athiest I suspect.

I read this, this week, in noted theological periodical ‘Q’:-

‘You don’t need to be a practicing Christian to take exception to Dawkins’s outspoken attacks on religious belief, particularly his suggestion that people of faith are ’stupid’. He should come into the prisions I visit as part of my Jail Guitar Doors project and tell the men benefitting from the pastoral care of the chapel team that their helpers are ’stupid’.

……Twenty-five years’ experience in politics has left me with a conviction that people who harbour no doubts about the self-evident correctness of their own viewpoint are downright dangerous.’

And the article continues, taking us through quantum physics, cosmology and faith. And I’m amazed- in a rock magazine? From a guy who earns his living through singing and recording? Truth can be found in unlikely places if you look hard enough….

I’m also thinking- can Christians defend their seeming opponents with such Grace?