Follow the links in this post to read the Minister’s current blogposts and listen to his podcast
The minister’s written pieces can be found on his blog: CAUTE – MAKING FOOTPRINTS NOT BLUEPRINTS The minister’s podcast can be listened to at the following links: https://footprints.buzzsprout.com
The Temptations by Celia James 18th May 2025
Although I do not approach the Bible in a devotional way, I am glad that I had become familiar with many of its stories as a child because an image from a bible story has sometimes jumped into my mind, usually at a time of stress. What happensis that I notice how the word I […]
We Cannot Know the Future
4th May 2025 Jerry Carr-Brion We Cannot Know the Future It is a common human desire to want to know what the future will bring. Many people crave certainty and fear an unknown future. Online astrologers and assorted gurus are read by millions, while the so-called ‘prophecies’ of Nostradamus continue to attract new interpretations. Of […]
A Child’s Vision of Heaven
by Marianna Michell – 11th May 2025 Twenty years ago, after leaving this church to enter ministry training in Manchester, I was living in the Rossendale valley in Lancashire – just over the moors from where I grew up near Nelson. Rawtenstall Unitarian church is a modern and strange-looking building on a rise off the […]
A poem for International Women’s Day by Joy Magezis, 8 March 2025
International Women’s Day International Women’s Day Very important holiday For me, millions of women worldwide Perhaps my story will explain My Grandma Esther Immigrant sweatshop worker A women’s needle trades union organiserHelped build General Strike of 20,000 Women like her demonstrated Against appalling working conditionsIn New York, 8 March 1908For better pay, conditions, suffrage Then Socialist Women’s ConferenceDeclared March 8, yearly International […]
King Arthur. Jack in the Green. They live! — A thought for the day by Marianna Michell
I am under no illusion that a congregation remembers what we talk about, once a service is over. However, what follows is my memory of two services held in our church, in mid-January, in 2002 and again in 2003. Our Minister, Andrew, invited dancers to take over the church space during the service: we formed […]
‘X’ Marks the Spot – A thought for the day by Marianna Michell
Does anyone remember a time when Christmas cards comprised a largish sheet of paper, folded twice? I suppose I was around 8, and I had in front of me a clean sheet of paper. I was creating Christmas cards by folding, then folding again. I had colouring pencils of course. On some cards I would […]
On ‘The Bright Field’, by R S Thomas – A thought for the day by Jerry Carr-Brion
Thought for the day 11th August 2024 Today I’d like to read the poem ‘The Bright Field’, by R S Thomas, who was a Welsh Anglican clergyman and well-known 20th-century poet. The Bright Field I have seen the sun break throughto illuminate a small field for a while, and gone my way and forgotten it. But that […]
Jacob and Jiyū Shūkyō – A thought for the day by Celia James, 23 June 2024
One of my A Level subjects at school was what was then called Religious Studies; the study was at a level which suited a layman in biblical studies, which is what I have remained, not a scholar, a curious, cherry-picking, idiosyncratically extrapolating layperson. One of the veins of the course was the Pentateuch and in the […]
“Rules are made for people, not people for rules” – A thought for the day by Marianna Michell, 9th June 2024
“Rules are made for people, not people for rules” Rules are made for people, not people for rules. I had this phrase in my head, then I was reminded of Jesus’ statement in Mark ch. 2, “The sabbath was made for man, and not man for the sabbath”. The Sabbath day is meant to be […]
BALANCE BETWEEN…. Thought for the day, 24th March 2024 by Marianna Michell
It’s the period of Lent and this year, the fasting month of Ramadhan overlaps with it. I’ve never seriously undertaken to follow Lent but, for some years, with others, I joined Muslim brothers and sisters to undertake the fast during Ramadhan. Outwardly, it’s 30 days of dawn to sunset without food or drink. That is […]