We’re doing a lot of work on our Stewardship Programme at present – part of the Year of Stewardship which we hope will, among other things, improve our struggling finances. Why is it that we behave as if everything we do in the church has to be designed from scratch every time? Wouldn’t do that with a car or a plane or with brain surgery, after all. So carrying as I do campaign medals from many a stewardship programme – pledge cards, visiting lists, training programmes, gift aid declarations and all – I’m trying hard to set out a ‘How to do it’ with seeming to do so.
Greetings also today to the Northern Ireland politicians and the voters on Election Day. Even if I was still living in Northern Ireland, I wouldn’t have had a vote today even though I lived there most of my life. Why? Because I am a citizen of the Irish Republic. Why? Because I am content to be so – but also because my parents were born in the then Irish Free State after the partition of 1922. And, before somebody points this out, I did have a vote in Westminster elections.