Thought for the week

Last week 26 international leaders gathered in Beijing. While they were together, they watched a massive military parade in Tiananmen Square which show-cased China’s growing military power. As Russian President Vladimir Putin, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and Chinese leader Xi Jinping were walking to the viewing platform their conversation was picked up on…

Sir Christopher Wren was an English architect, astronomer, mathematician and physicist who was one of the most highly acclaimed architects in the history of England. In 1666, after the Great Fire of London, he was given the responsibility of rebuilding 52 churches in the City of London. St Paul’s Cathedral, which is regarded as his…

I recently read an obituary to Tim Dutton CBE, KC, who died in June at the age of 68. He was a very distinguished barrister and a past Chairman of the Bar. When he was 5 years old, he began boarding as a chorister at Durham Cathedral and later attended Repton School in Derbyshire. When…

On Monday 6 August 1945 at 8.15am the US bomber Enola Gay dropped ‘Little Boy’, the first nuclear weapon ever used in warfare, on the city of Hiroshima. The whole city was destroyed and an estimated 120,000 people, 90% of whom were civilians, were killed instantly. Many more died later from burns, radiation sickness and…

What matters most to you? What defines you as a person? In July Scottie Scheffler, the 29-year-old world number one golfer, won The Open Championship. He said that winning The Open, one of the four golf majors, was “living out his dreams.” He only has to win the US Open to complete a career Grand…

One of the best-known and best-loved hymns in the English language is “Amazing Grace!” It was written by John Newton who was born 300 years ago this month. The hymn is John Newton’s personal testimony: “Amazing grace! how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me, I once was lost, but now am found,…

When our children were young, we lived in North Wales and were friends with a couple whose children were the same age as ours. Both families went to the same church. Our friends’ eldest daughter Sara did very well at school and was accepted to study medicine in Liverpool, but things didn’t work out as…

Spring has given way to summer, and the long evenings are with us. Many parts of the world never experience a long evening. They know nothing of the beauty and stillness of a summer evening. The busyness of the day has passed, the heat of the day has cooled, the skies are blue and the…

Restorative justice has a life-changing power. It brings together criminals and their victims to try to repair the harm and to find a positive way forward. Simon, Nick Dawson’s twin brother, was tortured and murdered by 2 men who had kicked and beaten 30-year-old Simon until he was unconscious. They removed his watch, stole his…

Many autocratic leaders don’t tolerate any dissent and treat people terribly. Sergei Tikhanovsky, the husband of Belarus’ opposition leader, has been freed unexpectedly and reunited with his wife in Lithuania. He has been forced into exile. Sergei was arrested in 2020 as he planned to run for president of Belarus. In 2021 he was sentenced…