From Rebecca Pickering
Sir, - I read at great length and with increasing depression
your article on Greenbelt (30 August), and I was,
to be honest, incredulous.
First, about the content of their topics, which were clearly so
wildly offbeat from any kind of mere Christianity as to be a new
sect all of their own - Greenbeltianity, perhaps.
The more depressing thing, however, was that your, no doubt,
gifted journalists, supposedly writing for the main Anglican
newspaper in the country, did not manage to raise between them even
a corporate eyebrow at the damaging and heretical content of most
of this extraordinary line-up.
I have nothing against a free and balanced discussion of such
topics, either by Greenbelt or by your newspaper; but your article
and their line-up look as though healthy intellectual debate is out
of fashion, and the only right thing to do is to challenge
established certainties with a new vigorous and destructive energy,
with no attempt whatsoever at any kind of balance.
How exactly is a non-existent God going to help? How is a faith
in brokenness for brokenness's sake the answer? Your article raised
no such concerns, and - correct me if I am wrong - but, the last
time I heard, the Church was a Christian affair where things like
amazing grace were dogmas of which we could be proud and which gave
us a message to share.
If Greenbelt's is the new Anglican message, I am not surprised
that the churches are emptying.
REBECCA PICKERING
1 Oxford Road, Kingston Bagpuize
Oxfordshire OX13 FZ
