Tag Archives: poverty

Frank Field’s Politics, Poverty and Belief

On 16 June 1986 Frank Field, then MP for Birkenhead, kindly came and spoke to the youth group at St Andrew’s, Bebington after being interviewed about his faith and politics in our 6.30 pm evening service. I was the curate who invited him to come and gave you a lift home to Birkenhead afterwards. He spoke very well in the service about Jesus’ teaching on the kingdom of God and its implications for national and political life, and the youth group found him inspiring as a Continue reading →

Giving sacrificially: Luke 20:45–21:4

I had the privilege of preaching at our church, Emmanuel, Loughborough, last Sunday morning (25 September) on ‘Giving sacrificially’, as part of a short series of three sermons on giving we’re presently having, and there are links below to the video and to the slides from my talk. Luke 20:45–21:4 was a fascinating passage to preach on, as it’s one of those places where the chapter division divides two sections which (IMHO) belong together. Comments most welcome! Here’s the link to the pdf file of Continue reading →

Get our book, Poverty in the Early Church and Today: A Conversation, in pdf for free!

I’m very pleased to announce that the wonderful people at Bloomsbury T&T Clark have agreed with the website Knowledge Unlatched to make Poverty in the Early Church and Today: A Conversation, the book which Hannah Swithinbank and I edited available online for free. We’re delighted, as we were keen to make the book freely accessible to people in the developing world—but our publishers have gone one better in making it freely available to anyone. For more about the book, see here and here. The download Continue reading →

A new book: Poverty in the Early Church and Today—A Conversation

I’m delighted to announce the publication of a new book which I’ve co-edited with Hannah Swithinbank of Tearfund, Poverty in the Early Church and Today—A Conversation (London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2019). Here’s an abstract for the whole book: Poverty, its causes and alleviation, are a perennial concern for humanity, and particularly for Christians because of their belief that all people are made in God’s image, and therefore valued and valuable. This book offers creative engagement with issues concerning people in poverty by bringing into conversation perspectives from the earliest church and today’s world. Continue reading →

Engaging with Poverty in the Early Church and Today—report

Well, two excellent days of conference are over and we’ve heard some 15 papers and two short reflections on the whole conference, as well as engaging in eight half-hour question and discussion times. It’s been very stimulating with fine talks, passion and a sense of the importance of the issues we’ve discussed. And all this grew out of a conversation over coffee after the morning service one Sunday between Chris Keith and David Parish—on this evidence, let’s have more of those kinds of conversations, please! The conference was Continue reading →