Once I bought a computer program. I’d been dreaming about it for ages, but it had similarly long been unaffordable. So when I saw the program available for half price on a well-established and renowned website I squeezed my savings, bought the program and started using it. Some time later, when I bought an upgrade, it turned out the software…

There has been a great international controversy over the release of Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, the only man convicted for the Lockerbie disaster. The Scottish government released him on compassionate grounds. The decision has been widely discussed, questioned, and finally condemned or supported. Two years after he left prison the discussion came up again. The Scottish government maintains its position that compassion…

Last Friday Rebecca Leighton, a nurse from Stepping Hill hospital, was released from arrest. Previously accused of the deaths of several patients she turned out to be innocent. But when she was arrested the media went mad. In her statement she said that ‘she’d been living in hell’. Last December a landscape architect Jo Yeates was murdered. The police arrested her…

The nomination of Abbot Hugh Gilbert of Pluscarden as bishop-elect has raised many expectations and hopes among the clergy and lay people of the diocese. The problem is that because they are so many and so different it’s not possible to fulfil all of them. The new bishop like every new boss will have to make up his mind and…

Once a man in his twenties appeared at the door of a parish house asking for money. He didn’t look ill, disabled or handicapped in any way. But because I’m a good and helpful man I wanted to know something about his needs. I don’t remember his story but I do remember it sounded like a made up one. He…