Showing everything tagged as Revd Dr Sam Wells

I want you to imagine that you’re having a bad day. Not the kind of bad day where you lose your keys, leave your phone on the bus, forget to post the red-letter bill payment and spill coffee all over your clothes the moment you get to work. I mean the kind of bad day when the frailty of existence all crowds in on you

It was 1986, and I was in northern Israel. A few weeks before I’d asked my uncle where it was that my grandparents had lived when they were there in the early fifties. It was that address that I held in my hand as I wandered around Haifa one August morning.

Here’s a story I’m sure you know. Once when a Lion was asleep a little Mouse began running up and down upon him. This soon awakened the Lion, who placed his huge paw upon the Mouse and opened his big jaws to swallow him. ‘Pardon, O King,’ cried the little Mouse, ‘forgive me this time. I shall never forget it

I’d gone to one of the best social enterprises in the city. It was widely known. I’d used it as a customer: they did a nice line in house removals and lawn care; and were a good source of picture frames. It was a great place to take students on my ethics and social engagement course: they could accommodate a lot of students at one go, tolerate their questions, and make their community open to scrutiny and enquiry.

The Christmas story in Luke’s gospel comes in two parts. The first part tells us what’s wrong with the world.

From an early age almost all of us have a craving for attention. A young child will sit at the top of the slide and say ‘Look at me!’ insistently before settling for the secondary pleasure of actually descending to the bottom.