I have just seen the press notice for some new paper by ‘the religion and society think-tank’ Ekklesia on the BBC Thought for the Day debate. Basically it calls for ‘fairness’ in allocating slots to humanists and indeterminate ‘others’ on the grounds that “it would be entirely appropriate in a mixed-belief society to hear the values, beliefs and moral convictions of humanists and others – including the many who call themselves ‘spiritual but not religious’.” It goes on to assert that “both religious and non-religious listeners” are urging the BBC to change its ways, noting along the way that “Anglicans or those with direct links to Anglicanism still overwhelmingly dominate amongst those who contribute to TFTD.”
Ekklesia (which – unless I am mistaken – is basically Jonathan Bartley and Simon Barrow) then asserts:
Religion does itself no favours by seeking maintain a privileged place in broadcasting. For many religions advantaging yourself against others goes against core teachings, which call for fairness and equality. There would be outrage if a BBC sports slot omitted to include coverage of several significant sports because they didn’t consider them ‘sporty’ enough. It is absurd that the exclusion of minor religions, humanists and others has continued unchallenged for so long.
It is difficult to know where to start with this – especially as the argument looks to have an element of personal pique to it: Jonathan Bartley was dropped from the Thought for the Day list and is clearly (and understandably) miffed. But let’s take it point by point:
1. As we pointed out in a debate last month, the argument is not about inclusiveness or ‘fairness’, but about distinctiveness. Appeals for fairness are usually empty and echo the cry of children in the school playground. TftD is a distinctive slot with presenters not doing yet another ‘opinion/comment’ piece, but interpreting the world from within their particular religious tradition. This is the only slot of its type through which this perspective might be gained.
2. I wholeheartedly agree that it is “entirely appropriate in a mixed-belief society to hear the values, beliefs and moral convictions of humanists and others – including the many who call themselves ‘spiritual but not religious’.” But we do hear these (particularly of humanists) in just about every other programme which assumes that humanism is the obviously and self-evidently ‘true’ world view. Should Christians (or religious people) be arguing for at least a single religious voice in every edition of In our Time, Start the Week, etc.? The question is not about the validity of such voices being heard; rather, it is whether those voices are to be heard in a distinctive slot such as TftD.
3. Who are the other ‘religious listeners’ backing Ekklesia’s view? I know of Ekklesia, but not any other grouping. I’d be interested to know.
4. Ekklesia obviously has a problem with Anglicanism generally. But they fial to recognise the distinctive rationale of the Church of England which is not congregational and which is organised to serve everybody in every parish regardless of their faith (even humanists), creed and state. The churches might fail a million times in this vocation, but it is a unique vocation and does mean that bishops and clergy are seriously well connected to grassroots communities all over the country. So, maybe the Anglican contribution should be welcomed and not discarded so easily. (More could be said, but…)
5. The weird argument about sport would suggest that Ekklesia thinks Match of the Day should have cricket and rounders in it too. After all, that is about ‘fairness and equality’. And, anyway, when did it become assumed that every religion calls for ‘fairness and equality’? Christianity calls for lots of things (including self-sacrifice and not misrepresenting your neighbour’s case), but ‘fairness and equality’?! The elder brother of the Prodigal Son will have his ears pricked up here!
This is superficial nonsense. I used to hold to a similar view to Ekklesia until I started to think about it and debate it. If TftD is to be broadened, it will need better arguments than these. Especially as – as was pointed out by Giles Fraser in our recent debate – there are humanists represented already: such as the Christians like Giles who contribute. How absurd it was (during that debate) to hear Erasmus cited as an example of the secular humanist tradition when he was, in fact, a Christian!
November 6, 2009 at 4:41 pm
Being American I am not really knoweldgeable about how the press works in the U.K. However I know that we have something in the works called the Fairness Doctrine that sounds a bit like what Ekklesia is promoting – where if you give one point of view you have to provide equal time to the opposing point of view.
I am a Humanist and my point of view is not heard very often over the airwaves – especially not on talk radio. In fact I hear quite a bit of talk against Humanism. However I am not a big fan of this.
In the United States we have freedom of expression and the press. This Fairness Doctrine would restrict that in the name of “fairness”. The dangers that this poses to the free speech of everyone, myself included, outweighs any supposed benefits.
There are enough voices, enough material out there in various ways that anyones ideas and beliefs can be easily found.
If we are really concerned about our ideas not getting a fair and unbiased hearing then instead of trying to force the government to give us equal time we need to find the best ways to organize and get our voices and ideas heard. And maybe in doing so wind up improving our society in ways that would not be possible with government enforced “fairness”.
November 6, 2009 at 5:20 pm
Nick. Just a couple of gentle corrections if I may:
You will see that the report was written neither by myself or Simon Barrow. If you our “about” or “staff” pages on our web site you will see that we have quite a few staff and that we raise £250,000 a year for peace and justice causes.
TFTD is an issue on which we have been working on for several years. It is mentioned in my 2006 book Faith and Politics After Christendom.
Regarding my personal experience I think it is better to be open about these things, rather than cover them up, and that is why we mention it in the report. However you don’t mention that I was dropped from TFTD ***because*** I called for Humanists to be included (having been warned by BBC Religion and Ethics not to do so).
Both Simon Barrow and I are Anglicans and attend Angllican churches.
Generally, I think it is better to have a debate on the issues, rather than seeking to discredit people? But when you are ready to debate in an honest and straight manner I will be very happy to do so.
Best wishes,
Jonathan
November 6, 2009 at 5:28 pm
As a non-practising Anglican I find that *Thought For The Day* often has a little nugget of specialness that makes the morning – sometimes the day, easier. Some of them are cosy some of them are twee, but I would hope that none of them are done with any intention of converting. TFTD should be uplifting and thought provoking, It shouldn’t be evangelising or proseletising. I would be interested to know if post Ross/Brand the content of TFTD is actually screened by anyone for controversial content before it goes out
November 6, 2009 at 5:33 pm
Christine, the production is very tight – some presenters regard it as too cautious and controlled. It certainly isn’t and shouldn’t be about proselytising.
November 6, 2009 at 5:40 pm
Jonathan, I linked through to your press notice where your ‘because’ is referenced. My piece does not ‘discredit’ you at all – indeed, it has also allowed you to make the points you do in your comment, which I am happy to see.
What is ‘dishonest’ or not ‘straight’ about the points I make or questions I pose? Or do you mean they are inconvenient? I am frequently told that the church needs to be more robust and less sensitive when it comes to criticism or questioning in the public arena – hence my robust approach. I have to take as well as give – so I am happy for you to robustly take me on.
I was disappointed you weren’t at the debate we had with Ariane Sherine and Andrew Copson – your points would have been given a good airing there.
November 6, 2009 at 6:17 pm
I’m all for being robust, but if we do it honestly and on the issues. Talking about Ekklesia as being just two people (“unless I am mistaken”) when exactly who works for Ekklesia is clearly displayed on our website either means you just haven’t bothered to check and are happy to make statements on heresay that many would perceive as belittling, or its deliberate. I believe its the former, but the fact that you need to make aside comments like that at all suggests to me you aren’t keen on sticking to the issues. Similarly references to “personal pique” and “miffed” attribute motive which again is unnecesary and unhelpful.
For clariication, and so we can put that one to bed, I wasn’t at all miffed about being dropped. As Giles Fraser might have told you, I called him before I went on the Today Programme and said “I’m going to do this and I am going to be dropped from TFTD, but that is the price I am willing to pay because I feel strongly about this issue”. I went in with my eyes open, and knew what the consequences would be. (They were also made pretty clear to me by someone at Religion and Ethics too). I wasn’t upset. It was what I expected. And there is certainly nothing “clearly” (as you suggest) about it!
I wasn’t at the TFTD debate, for reasons that I raised with you beforehand. The debate was constructed with two Anglicans on one side, against two humanists on the other. It was established as a “humanist” v “Anglican” narrative. As I said to you before the debate, I didn’t think that was constructive. I suggested having a Christian speaker on the opposing side (one speaker could have easily been added but that idea was rejected sadly). To have joined in from the “floor” would not have meant the same equality for the arguments, and would have been counter productive. (But I hear what you are say in your blog above about equality not being a Christian thing, so I appreciate that argument doesn’t carry much weight with you.)
However if you are really wanting a debate between Christians that addresses the issues then I’m up for it. Let’s do it. What about an email conversation that we then subsequently publish online? I’m game if you are.
November 6, 2009 at 6:38 pm
Jonathan,
You seem to think I am dishonest in this. That is something I strongly rebutt. You do not address the questions I raise or the points I make in my post. Two responses to your complaint:
1. You are right: I did not look at the detail of your website, so I can understand you feeling I was discourteous. I am glad to point to the nature of Ekklesia’s contributors/workers.
2. I seem constantly to read about your TftD ‘sacrifice’ and am not, I think, wrong to suspect that this keeps on being brought out because it rankles. I can see it from the point of view you describe, but might I suggest that what I call ‘pique’ comes through whether you intend it or not?
I find your reasons for not being at the debate bewildering. Do you only attend debates in which you are given a prominent place as a speaker? You could have made an effective contribution from the floor – many people did and without the main speakers being able to respond. You also suggest that we had some sort of conversation about your non-attendance before the event. This is not true. You tweeted me to ask why there was no religious ‘anti’ person on the panel; I responded that I had no idea as I wasn’t organising the debate. And that was it.
Your comment about my views on ‘equality’ is just silly.
I am very happy to debate by email and publish it. But I have to say again: you had an opportunity to do just this at that public debate and you chose not to turn up. I do wonder, however, if TftD is the most demanding issue to take up our time in this way. Perhaps we should wait until the BBC Trust reports and then decide how to take it from there. Or continue the debate on here?
Don’t think from all this that I intended to belittle you or Ekklesia – I didn’t. But even think-tanks need to be questioned. If you think my post (and subsequent response to you) was tough, don’t ever think of becoming a bishop…
November 6, 2009 at 6:50 pm
The exchange between yourself and Jonathan is unfortunately more a debate than a discussion. Neither appears to be advancing points in a spirit which suggests that you may perhaps both be mistaken. That was the spirit in which the anthropologist Claude Levi-Strauss who has just died approached discussion. Unless we talk to each other with the aim of discovering truths we had not sufficiently grasped or even never realised, we are merely staying in the ruts we have carved out for ourselves in order to feel secure.
November 6, 2009 at 6:51 pm
And there was I thinking I would look quite good in purple…
For us this is an important issue of justice as I have said (though I appreciate you disagree) although of course we spend far more time looking at other things – MPs expenses, peace issues, restorative justice, spiritual capital etc.. (Have a look at our website sometime for the full list) Incidentally Did you see our Remembrance Report out this week? Look out for our ComRes poll on remembrance also this weekend.
Right, shall I start then by responding to the substantive comments in your blog? I don’t have your email address, Do you want to DM me with it on Twitter, and we can get cracking…?
November 6, 2009 at 6:53 pm
Peter, you are right. That is why Jonathan made the suggestion (about an email debate to be published later online) and I suggested we wait until the BBC Trust has reported. But, having started the matter, I didn’t feel I could not approve the subsequent ‘discussion’ between us. I still hope the questions I raised will be responded to.
November 6, 2009 at 6:57 pm
Jonathan, ‘purple’ is too often mistaken for ‘pink’ – and that causes other problems.
I have looked at your site, but haven’t looked at the Remembrance stuff yet.
I think we should wait until the BBC Trust reports (it met today apparently). Our discussion will then be better informed (or made redundant) by the decision they come to. Is that OK with you? I’ll DM my address anyway.
November 6, 2009 at 10:11 pm
Ekklesia do seem to be the thinnest-skinned think tank around.
November 7, 2009 at 9:01 am
A couple of thoughts:
– I’d be interested to know if there’s any statistical evidence behind the ‘religious and non-Christian listeners’ who are ‘urging’ the BBC to change TFTD. There are probably people from the same 2 groups who are urging the opposite. How many people are we talking about? 2? 2 million?
– Ekklesia are so strongly identified with disestablishment – Christian advocates of a secular state? – that I find my first response is ‘of course they would say that wouldn’t they’. Which probably isn’t very helpful!
November 7, 2009 at 9:29 am
As we consider whether “fairness” requires secularists to take a greater role in TftD, it is pertinent to remind them that in the last Census, 70% of the population described themselves as Christian
( however unfocussed many might be). Given the right to differentiate between atheist and agnostic these groups together only registered about 12%. The fact that they are heavily over represented in the mass media does gives them a disproportionate view of their own significance.
If I were convinced that “fairness” was the only measure of suitable apportionment, I would be only too pleased to see the media reflecting “fairness” with Christians more prominently represented across the public space.
We might not then find the kind of offensive horrible unfunny anti-christian rant I heard from David Mitchell on last nights “News Quiz”( which seems to have its very own uber liberal agenda) that never drew a word of rebuttal from anyone.
November 7, 2009 at 10:57 am
I suppose the arguments about apportioning air-time to this or that person or group are really attempts to try to define what TFTD ought to be. There seems to be less of a problem with Prayer for the Day which I personally find more cogent and compelling in its way than the efforts of TFTD speakers to be “relevant”. As I said earlier, much to Anne Leslie’s irritation, I find the problem with TFTD is not whether the speaker is of this or that religion or whether the Anglicans are getting a fair crack of the whip but whether they are interesting. Being interesting requires much more of an effort than some speakers put into their contributions. This is a nut the BBC often fails to crack, don’t you think?
Martin makes a point about the News Quiz. I agree these rants are unfunny. However, there is a saying about water off a duck’s back and I’m reminded of a remark of the Jesuit poet Gerard Manley Hopkins in a letter to Robert Bridges to the effect that once your belief is deep and secure you no longer worry about its assertion but are content. Put another way, in relation to your point about “fairness”, Martin, I remember once raging on about some issue to a super-intelligent Liverpudlian scientist – a Catholic – and he said: “Ah, so you can’t bring yourself to be able to accept injustice”.
November 7, 2009 at 12:06 pm
Nick – I haven’t received your email address, so here is a quick response to your points. (The BBC Trust sub committee meeting incidentally was not as I understand it to respond to the British Humanist Association, but the National Secular Society).
1. I agree that TFTD is a distinctive slot, and we have said it should continue. The fact is that certain Christian traditions are also routinely excluded in favour of the “big boys” (and they quite often are boys) as are those from minor religions, alongside humanist, secular and agnostic voices. TFTD is not a unique slot however. There are many other ‘TFTD-type’ slots at the BBC in the regional output. These are not exclusive like TFTD, and include voices that are excluded from Radio 4’s TFTD. This shows that the slot can easily be expanded without losing its distinctiveness.
2. The argument that “every other programme assumes that humanism is the obviously and self-evidently ‘true’ world view” doesn’t hold up when one looks at it.
(i) Humanists (like many Christians) often complain that their perspective is routinely excluded. (And they self-evidently have more grounds for this in the case of TFTD).
(ii) Underlying the BBC output is a whole mixture of different ‘worldviews’ (although I don’t like the word as it over simplifies the actuality). There is for example a secularist one which is distinct from humanist. There is a utilitarian one. There is a post-modern one. There is consumerist one. The list goes on and on, and to lump it all together as “Humanist” is to completely misunderstand Humanism in the way that we are discussing it (ie the Humanism of the BHA). There is of course also a “Christian” worldview at the BBC. There are loads of Christians and those from other religions who work at the BBC producing mainstream programming and their ‘worldview’ shapes the editorial content continually. The top guy is a Christian, as well as well known presenters like Simon Mayo, Jeremy Vine… To give an example in practice the production team on J V’s prime time R2 show is made up of many Christians, and their faith certainly drives the way they do their job.
(iii) Religion is about the only area of BBC output I can think of where there are specially protected slots. Daily acts of worship are broadcast, there is Prayer for the Day, Songs of Praise. In every BBC local station there is a Sunday morning religious show. At the moment we have a History of Christianity running on BBC 4, An Island Parish etc.. We have had many similar series previously. The Big Questions, Moral Maze etc.. give spaces for ethical contribution and regularly features Christian voices. Radio 2 has just run a whole week on “Faith in the World”. The list goes on and on…
(iv) Christians continually give their opinions on BBC Radio and TV on a whole range of issues on the wider output of Newsnight, Question Time etc… Christine Odone, Anne Atkins, Giles Fraser, Bishops… John Sentamu routinely stages stunts and gets interviewed, cutting up his dog collar on Andrew Marr or telling Chris Evans to ‘love himself’. Rowan Williams was just on Newsnight. I am sure that we both don’t agree with a lot of what such people say, but the fact remains they are there. I appreciate that there are a lot of Christians out there who moan that they don’t get a hearing. I would suggest it is usually because they don’t have something interesting or relevant to say. If they did, any decent journalist would report it (and indeed they do).
4. To my knowledge we are the only religious group doing work in this area to open up TFTD. However we get a steady stream of emails and messages of support from religious (and non religious people) about it. Just in the last 48 hours I have had more. We also find that people are changing their views. For example I had a conversation with former TFTD presenter and editor of Third Way Huw Spanner the other day, and he has now changed his view. However, for us this is not a numbers game. It is an issue of justice and fairness.
5. Ekklesia is fully aware of the rationale of the Church of England. Being aware and understanding it, is not the same as agreeing with it in its entirety. It is legitimate to praise some aspects of it and critique others. Just two weeks ago we pointed out how local churches were in a great position to challenge the BNP, because of the point you made about being connected to grassroots communities all over the country. However, we also felt it was right to point to what we felt was unhealthy and how the church is playing into the BNP’s hands with regard to its Christian Nation rhetoric. We have praised the C of E’s work on climate change, but we have also pointed out that the Church’s largest investments are in oil and mining companies which are ravaging the environment.
6. The sporting analogy about Match of the Day is not thought out well. It is one which Giles Fraser originally advanced I believe. To equate TFTD with Match of the Day, and say that including humanists would be like including cricket doesn’t accurately reflect the situation. TFTD is more like a programme which collects sports together surely? It’s a religious programme which brings different views together in the same way a sports programme brings together sports. From that perspective it would be absurd to exclude cricket. Yet, TFTD routinely does the equivalent by excluding key elements of belief from TFTD.
I appreciate you feel that the BBC Trusts decision might bring an end to the conversation, but I would suggest that these issues are important because they go way beyond TFTD, so I do hope you will continue to discuss…
November 7, 2009 at 6:50 pm
Well! How interesting is this thread?! My eyebrows are sky high. I have to agee with Doug Chaplin about Ekklesia’s thin skin…
…to the extent that I now have major concerns about the agenda behind their ‘message’.
jonathan Bartley writes:’ John Sentamu routinely stages stunts and gets interviewed, cutting up his dog collar on Andrew Marr or telling Chris Evans to ‘love himself’. Rowan Williams was just on Newsnight. I am sure that we both don’t agree with a lot of what such people say, but the fact remains they are there. I appreciate that there are a lot of Christians out there who moan that they don’t get a hearing. I would suggest it is usually because they don’t have something interesting or relevant to say. If they did, any decent journalist would report it (and indeed they do).’
Jonathan, since when did ordinary Anglicans in the pews ( or their humble parish priests) have access to the ‘decent journalists;you describe?
At the moment our benefice website has a direct link to the Ekklesia website, which as parish priest, I was – until today – happy to promote as I thought it encouraged honest and even courageous debate. Somthing which as a ‘cradle’ Anglican I considered to be the heart of the Anglican tradition. Now I find that it is more discourtesy and cheap shots at our leaders, as well as a dismissal of ‘ordinary’ Anglicans who make up my parishioners and myself but who – to date – have no ready access to journalists.
Jonathan, I am seriously thinking now of cutting our website link to Ekklesia for the simple reason that you seem to view the people I serve, parishioners and Archbishops, with contempt and disdain.
(And before you say it, yes I am a priest in Southwark Diocese but not in Nick’s area. So I owe him no particular episcopal loyalty, and I am not the type to give loyalty where it is not owed.)
Is there any reason why my two parishes should continue to support Ekklesia? I look forward to hearing it – from Jonathan and/or Nick, or anyone else.
November 7, 2009 at 8:09 pm
“Cheap shots”? Sorry, I think you have the wrong end of the stick! The “don’t agree with what they say” referred to Atkins and Odone rather than Williams and Sentamu! (I am sure Nick agrees often with Williams and more with Sentamu). My words for Sentamu were meant as praise not ridicule. Sorry if you interpreted them differently. He jumps out or airplanes, camps out in his cathedral etc… and knows exactly what to do to get his message across. He’s a genius. He did excellently on Chris Evans, and his point about only being able to love others if you love yourself was just what Evans needed to hear. My point is that Sentamu does have something interesting to say, and so he gets reported.
Re this “thick skin, thin skin” thing… (which is making me smile quite a bit every time I read it!) with no disrespect to the ‘restles bishop’ or yourself, the comments above really don’t even cause a tickle!
Perhaps I should explain. Since we were formed in 2001, Ekklesia has had editorials in national newspapers laying into it, BNP supporters sending volumes of hatemail, right wing journalists virtually lining up to have a pop over our position on peacemaking, not to mention creationists blogging all sorts of crap about us. We have had secularists having a go because we are religious. We have had religious commentators having a go because we work with Humanists. We have had Littlejohn lay into us in the Mail over St George and Damian Thompson with an apparent personal vendetta to the point where he has re-designed the Ekklesia logo on his Telegraph blog with three “KKK”s !!! There’s lots more but I won’t bore you with it. This is just the day to day rough and tumble of what we do, and we just get on with it.
With the greatest respect, a few jibes in a bishops blog just don’t compare. If anything they make us smile. My point to Nick was not about feeling hurt at all. It was simply to suggest that if I was going to invest the time in responding to his comments, I wanted him to engage on the issues.
I have sought to engage with the issues above as Nick requested. Up to you entirely whether you want to…
November 7, 2009 at 8:46 pm
PS – One point I didn’t address. My comments above were not about “ordinary people in the pews” or “humble parish priests”, but rather those who you would expect to be commenting/ dealing with the media. But if you have parishioners who want to engage with the media, then we would be happy to come and do a workshop on how the media works, what journalists are looking for, how to be effective etc.. It is a service that some groups within the C of E have found useful. It’s a shame your Diocesen Communications Team doesn’t provide that.
November 7, 2009 at 10:56 pm
Blimey! Touting for business already! Our comms team has offered this where appropriate.
November 7, 2009 at 11:00 pm
Jonathan, my heart is bleeding for you. Is there anyone anywhere that hasn’t been attacked by the sad Damian Thompson? And why do you assume I would agree more with Sentamu than Williams? That is bizarre. And you well know that lots of people who have interesting things to say don’t get reported simply because they don’t have the right connections. It is much more complicated than simply ‘having interesting things to say’ – although people with nothing interesting to say shouldn’t get an airing… but sometimes do.
While I am on… can you say more about why you got the push from the TFTD list? Your account in your initial response makes it sound like you entered calculated martyrdom – which might be true – but it looks a bit neat and I wonder how the BBC people would account for it.
November 7, 2009 at 11:21 pm
Jonathan, I DM’d my email address and mobile number and sent it to everyone in the world. Since then I have been out. But thanks for your lengthy reply – I think it is best if we continue this discussion on here as this is where we started it.
You are right about the National Secular Society being the body that brought the complaint. As I have said before, we would fit the entire membership of this group into one of our cathedrals… if it wasn’t being used for worship. Which taps into your ‘fairness’ argument. They (and the BHA – for which I have considerably more respect) are tiny groups in comparison with the churches and other religious groups in this country – it is boggling that they are taken so seriously when they represent so few. They also play statistics when it suits them and try to reject statistical games when it doesn’t. But they can’t have it both ways.
I am surprised that you lump national and regional programming together. Also, you haven’t addressed the question of TFTD being not a comment/opinion piece, but speakers speaking out of their tradition.
We’ll have to differ as to whether or not the ‘humanism’ world view assumption holds up or not. During our recent public debate it became clear that once the secular humanists have told us how nice the world is and how everyone ought to appreciate its beauty and fragility and then be nice to each other, there wasn’t anything else to say. If I had more time I would give examples of this in respect of particular issues.
I agree with your right to critique the C of E and I agree with your critique of the ‘Christian Nation’ stuff. I don’t agree with your disestablishment stance (whihc will form another debate, I am sure) and am not convinced you do ‘get’ the unique rationale of the C of E. However, that is not for now.
The sporting analogy was not invented by Giles Fraser. It can – like any analogy – be pulled into all sorts of weird shapes. The argument is that TFTD (in the context of the Today programme) is not a ‘Grandstand’ but a ‘Match of the Day’ – that is its distinctive character and purpose.
I am content to continue this and will be interested in the Trust’s response to the NSS’s complaint. I will respond more fully when I have more time. In the meantime, Remembrance Day, pastoral issues and a Confirmation beckon (after sleep)… after which I am off for a few days break. So, more to follow.
Thanks for engaging.
November 7, 2009 at 11:49 pm
Thanks Nick.
I set out the account of what happened re my own experience re Thought for the Day in an article in January here: http://www.ekklesia.co.uk/node/8302 Probably best if people read that than reproduce the account here.
Off to bed too…
November 8, 2009 at 7:45 am
Jonathan,
Thank you for your response to my questions. Unfortunately, you have only added to my concern. I am sorry you seem to take any disagreement with your comments so personally and respond so angrily and nastily. You also need to be clearer in your posts whom you support and whom you are attacking. You listed Cristian Odone, Ann Atkins, Giles Fraser and Bishops’ on one line with no differentiation and then immediately named John Sentamu and Rowan Williams. They are both bishops. It was not unreasonable for me as a reader to assume they were the bishops to whom you referred. Your next sentence was that you didn’t agee with a lot of what ‘such people’ had to say. Again, it is reasonable for a reader to assume you are including the named examples you have just given. Are you usually so unclear on the Ekklesia website articles?
As for the gratuitous jibe at my Diocesan Communications department and the arrogant assumptions you make about your readers and what we are looking for from you …Well, that rather illustrates my continuing concern beautifully.
November 8, 2009 at 9:22 am
Erica. Haven’t taken comments personally at all, please don’t worry. (Bless you for being concerned). I am getting the impression though that whatever I write here to you isn’t going to be interpreted in the spirit that I wrote it. I don’t think it’s going to be very helpful to continue corresponding with you this way therefore, but I’ll happily chat with you on the phone or perhaps we can meet for a coffee?
Best,
Jonathan
November 8, 2009 at 1:38 pm
>– Ekklesia are so strongly identified with disestablishment – Christian advocates of a secular state? – that I find my first response is ‘of course they would say that wouldn’t they’. Which probably isn’t very helpful!
Offtopic and musing, but I’ve often groped for a description of the Ekklesia “post/non Christendom, in favour of levelling the playing field, and critical of religion having more of a place in the sun than other views” position, and I wonder if “the disestablishment” is a good phrase.
Rgds
approach
November 8, 2009 at 1:41 pm
A further thought:
“6. The sporting analogy about Match of the Day is not thought out well.”
Perhaps cricket being excluded from sports news programmes/channels would be a better – though still weak – analogy.
November 8, 2009 at 4:20 pm
After decades in Fleet Street may I just add in the midst of this appalling heat of debate that there is no telling what news editors will find interesting and that the aim of those who aren’t in the news business should be to get on with their lives. Why should any real person want to create media interest?
November 8, 2009 at 4:28 pm
Peter, you are absolutely right.
November 14, 2009 at 7:35 pm
[...] Bartley) are all wound up about religious broadcasting – in particular Thought for the Day. Nick Baines comes up with an interesting [...]
November 14, 2009 at 8:09 pm
[...] to my previous post, which picked up a brief news item by Ekklesia and a response by Nick Baines, here’s a much longer and informative paper about Thought for the Day that lay [...]