August 2003

Andrew Brown linked to an article about homosexuality from a Texas preacher. It’s not what you think. In fact, it’s great.

Real Live Preacher, as he calls himself, writes honestly and writes well. So, I sat and read the whole site, archives and all. I cannot help but think that, had someone like this been around when I was beginning to realise that I couldn’t stay in my church, things might have been different.

The Preacher’s life story had some echoes with me. That said, for me there was no great event in my life which was the final straw, no example of human suffering which finally showed that there could not be a good God running it all; instead there was just the drip, drip, drip of guilt and doubt, eventually wearing me down.

The Preacher came back to his faith by deciding that “faith is something you do, not something you think. In fact, the greater your doubt the more heroic your faith.” He decided to gamble his life, living in faithfulness to God, without really knowing or caring whether God existed:

I pushed all my chips across the table. The preacher bet it all. Why? Because the idea that there is a God who cares for us busts my heart wide open. Because I pushed reason as far as it can go but I wanted to go farther still. Because I wanted to, and… well… I just wanted to.

I can’t follow him where he’s gone, but I can’t help but admire him.

shreena‘s posting about how Tony Blair may allow “faith groups” a role in policy making has lead me into an interesting discussion, touching on evangelical pressure groups, inerrancy, Total Depravity, and, of course, gay bishops. Just got round to posting another thing to it, which is why I mention it.

Punting out to Grantchester on Saturday night was hard in the heat, so the other PaulW ended up doing most of the work. I think he’s got a much more efficient style, as I was splashing more. Punting back in the dark was enlivened by low branches. As we were returning, we also saw some youfs wandering along the Meadows looking for some sort of rave thing that was supposed to be happening, but heard no repetitive beats.

Still too hot, although aircon is working here at the moment. Dancing tonight should be interesting.

Via Cogito, Ergo Sumana comes advice from Salon’s relationships guru (go for their “free day pass” to read it), directed at a woman who is tired of blokes not saying what they mean. In his response, the woman is advised to date an engineer. This is an excellent plan, as Scott Adams well knew. The problem is that we engineers can be a little too honest for some people: but still, for that reader, it sounds like the columnist gave the right advice.

Dancing last night was ridiculously hot. I brought a change of shirt for going to the pub afterwards, which was lucky as the other one was wringing wet by the end of it. Yuck. I think I’ve just about mastered the new jive and waltz bits now.