By Steve Roberts

“What is good news?” asked the advert for the Church Weekend. My immediate reaction “we don’t have to believe rubbish any more” surprised me so here is an attempt to tease that out a bit…

We live in a rational, intelligible world. Throughout history human beings have had to invent or imagine gods to explain what they couldn’t understand in other terms. The world was unintelligible. This is no longer true. We can understand the way the world works. We don’t have all the answers – and maybe we never will – but we do know that the world is intelligible. We know how to find answers. We don’t need the supernatural, gods, spirits, mystic fields or anything to fill in any gaps so we can comprehend the world we live in.

All religions are human activities. All the great faith movements can inspire and motivate us to bring out the best in humanity. And they can also bring out the worst of our hatred, bigotry and violence. But they are of our making – and we can continue to create and recreate them. We can keep what is good and true and helpful and creative and inspires. And we can ditch what is bad, wrong, hurtful or just not relevant.

We live in a world governed by chance. Stuff happens. When we are hit by illness or misfortune it isn’t personal or anything to do with what we deserve, it’s just bad luck. We don’t have to worry that our God made it happen, let it happen. We don’t have to worry that we didn’t have enough faith or didn’t pray enough or in the right way. It just happens randomly. There are things we do that can alter the risks – we make choices as best we can, and some will be better than others – but some will get away with it and some won’t and that’s just the way it is – it isn’t personal!

Theology and doctrine are ultimately unimportant. Believing the right things won’t get you to heaven and believing the wrong things won’t condemn you to hell. Whether or not you believe in an afterlife, whether or not you believe in a God, we know there are many different beliefs associated with that which is called God, many different great religions, and we can’t say any has a monopoly of truth. All have inspired greatness. All have glimpsed truths. All have different beliefs about God and salvation – both between traditions and within each tradition. The very diversity of belief in good people shouts out that it can’t matter to any God worth following exactly which particular creed (or, as good Baptists none!) we assent to.

You are free; you don’t have to accept any creed or belief. No god will harm or favour you if you accept or reject any faith (but sadly that can’t be said for all human adherents of faith). You don’t have to accept anything handed down if it harms or diminishes you or others. You are free to take the best of the stories, the inspiration, the sustenance from the tradition and let it inspire and motivate you. You are free to ignore or reinterpret or reject outright what we now know to be untrue, what belongs to an earlier time whether that be some minutiae of doctrine or the very existence of anything which can be called God. You are free – so stop worrying and enjoy your life!

Good News? It is to me!

                                                                                    Steve Roberts