Thoughts, Engagements, Updates from Fraser Watts
Halloween raises very interesting issues. There are historical debates about where Halloween comes from. Many think that it originated in a pagan ritual, which was then converted into the Feast of all Saints and the associated Commemoration of the Departed. However, not everyone agrees with that historical narrative. More recently, Halloween…
The headline data from the 2019 British Social Attitudes survey is that the percentage of those who think of themselves as Church of England is down, in just a year, from 14% to 12%. I assume that rounding of averages percentages distorts this slightly, and that the real drop is…
We seem to be moving into a new politics. For decades, politics has been dominated by the debate between left and right. Now there is a new debate between populist nationalism and liberal international. That was seen very clearly in the French Presidential elections in which both centre-left and centre-right…
We are just starting Lent, and church services at this time of year remind us of Jesus in the wilderness. The wilderness is fascinating in all sorts of ways, though I must admit that my knowledge of wilderness is somewhat second-hand. I caught something of the magic of the wilderness…
People remain fascinated by church buildings, and visit them a lot, if often not when services are taking place. They sometimes play an important role in religious conversion, and a particularly vivid account of that is offered by the novelist Susan Howatch about the role that Salisbury Cathedral played in…
Ours is a time of church decline. However, I believe, it also a time of opportunity for churches. If the churches are to seize the opportunities, they will need to start from a good analysis of the present religious climate and be strategic in their efforts. It is no good…
There are often tensions between people of different religions. A recent feature of this is that there have been increasing allegations that people or groups are hostile to a particular religious group, or phobic of them. I suggest that tensions are often heightened by such accusations of religious intolerance. Even…
I have worked in science and religion for the last 25 years. However, in many ways, I feel dissatisfied with the field, and with my contribution to it. Humanity is facing a series of urgent threats, and they mostly involve some combination of science and religion. In each of them…
There continues to be quite a lot of public interest in exorcism (or ‘deliverance’, as the Church of England prefers to call it). For several years I had a role in deliverance on behalf of the church, and so know something about it from the inside. One of the fascinating…
I recently attended an excellent conference on forgiveness in Coventry. All the leading figures working on forgiveness were there. My own particular interest is in bringing the different perspectives on psychology and religion into dialogue. Though psychological work on forgiveness as therapy is far superior to religious traditions in terms…