My Dear Lupine I read with interest your recent attempts at luring to their spiritual deaths the human collective (they call it a “church”, but that seems too noble a word for such an unimpressive bunch), you have been assigned. And I must say on the surface it seemed impressive. Suspect theology – heresy as […]
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When the gospel rainfall stops the cultural dam dries up
My home town of Perth, Western Australia is a dry place. A very dry place, and it’s gotten drier. When my family first moved to sunny Perth in the 1970s, the long term rainfall average for our city was approximately 850mm per year. Now that sounds okay, and indeed it is more rainfall than London […]
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Church Planter: Which core team member do you need to know best before you plant?
The answer of course, is you. You need to know you the best before you even think about planting a church. If you don’t, you’re heading for a fall. I was asked that question this very morning about what a planter needs to know about the core team, and my answer was simply that. Unless […]
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Absolutely Ripped or Absolutely Gutting?
Is the headline intended to be ironic? This is the accompanying photo: I mean, this is Elliot, formerly Ellen Page, and according to the celebratory article, he’s absolutely ripped. Sure is. I mean we can see where the surgeon’s knife absolutely ripped off Page’s breasts, for the sake of, for the sake of, what, exactly? […]
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Many unchurched people are actually envious of church. Here’s why.
Hint: It’s not because of the worship music. With all the hand-wringing going on about how bad the church is (and that’s just from Christians), it’s time to remind ourselves that so much of what church is, is so good that people envy it. Yes that’s right, “envy”. Here we are in a cottage industry […]
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Let’s not trade an over-realised eschatology for an under-realised one
This is a guest blog post from a young Pentecostal pastor in Perth, Joel Seneque, who I have gotten to know these past few years. He’s smart, articulate, well-read theologically, a church planter who wants to see people come to know Jesus, and on top of that he’s a runner! My last post critiqued the […]
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We need to grow old together
“Bill and Melinda Gates are getting divorced.” It was the headline you announce after you look at your phone to your still-in-bed spouse early in the morning as various house members are getting up and about and out the door. In the kinda way I said “Kobe Bryant died!” or “Prince Philip died!”. No one […]
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Today is our 25th
Today is our 25th wedding anniversary. I’ve gotten up early (as I always do) to write this. Jill seems to sleep her deepest at 6am. I pulled the blankets over her gently breathing body, covering her foot up, (one always seems to find itself astray and lie cold bereft in the mornings at the edge […]
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Jesus washed his disciples’ feet: the disciples of abusers wash their cars
One thing that struck me reading the 31:8 safeguarding review of now-disgraced Anglican leader, Jonathan Fletcher, was the observation that Fletcher had his interns or ministry apprentices wash his car or mow his lawn. Why did it strike me? Because that was my observation of another leader who has been caught up in an abuse […]
Recent Posts
Nonna and Poppa Christians for an Immigrant Age
I am attending a 21st birthday party tonight. I don’t get to so many of those these days. Usually fiftieths, funerals, and weddings of those younger than me who know me through church. It’s the 21st birthday of my god-daughter’s younger brother. The third child of four in an Italian family. The whole extended family […]
Off the road and into the ditch with James KA Smith
In this brave new world of post-Christian sexual ethics, even among Christians, I am not sure what counts as a disordered love any longer. Well, maybe I am, but more of that later. Calvin University Professor, James KA Smith, whose work interpreting Augustine’s moral and spiritual frameworks for post-moderns has rightly been hailed as groundbreaking, […]
Raise Up a Pile of Stones
As far as the east is from the west so far has he removed our sins from us. Psalm 103:12 That’s the message of the Bible at least. The message of our modern culture that spent about three decades telling us that God could not possibly be a God of judgement?: As far as the […]
Newsflash: Churches Sexual Diversity Training Day Speech revealed!
The following transcript was recently handed to stephenmcalpine.com by an eponymously named source. Stephenmcalpine.com does not vouch for the veracity of the transcript, but was, nevertheless, impressed with the wisdom, insight and sheer daring-do of the eponymously named source. The leaking of this revealing document s comes just one day after this report in The […]
Mark’s Zucker Punch: It’s Strictly Business
My twin brother put it well yesterday in light of Facebook’s decision to remove all Australian news content (including my blog?) from its feed. Zuckerberg isn’t immoral – he’s amoral. Which isn’t perhaps as much a moral declaration about Zuckerberg as much as it is an observation about him. Ok, I know the brilliant The […]
Carl, Ravi and the God of 1Samuel
I read the RZIM public announcement about Ravi Zacharias today, followed by a Vanity Fair expose of the fallout from Carl Lentz at Hillsong New York. Sad and sobering. Sad for those victims of Ravi and for those who were swept up in Carl’s very expensive designer train. Sad too that there is often so […]
Clerical bullying and spiritual abuse: Are they the same thing?
This weekend it is one year exactly since The Christianity Today article was published that brought about the end of the public ministry of Steve Timmis, former CEO of Acts29 and founder of The Crowded House network of churches in the UK. I played no small part in that article’s creation, although Timmis had been […]
The State of Victoria is hunting down the bad guys. Is it coming for you?
If I’d written in my new book Being the Bad Guys that education materials would soon be sent to churches by a government in Australia to tell them how they are permitted to talk about sexuality matters to avoid prosecution, I would have been laughed at. Yet that is what the Victorian Government has just […]
When your Ethos makes you the bad guy
My book is out. I am not. My book Being the Bad Guys was released yesterday, Feb 1st, while ironically everyone in Perth where I live was placed into lockdown due to a huge outbreak of COVID (one person). We have a treadmill so I can still run, but we get an hour outside, so […]
You are right Rev Macrae, bad theology does kill
And now they’re all lining up to hand back their gongs. It’s a veritable gong conga line. And now the church is getting in on the act too. Or at least one part of the church here in Australia. A senior cleric in the Uniting Church has handed back his Order of Australia in protest […]
Margaret’s Kangaroo Court
Another year another Margaret Court story. The furore around the tennis great receiving a national award for community services (via her church Victory Life in Perth running a large food distribution program) on Australia Day, will ensure that anyone nominated from now one will have the sexual gloryometer run over them first, just to make […]
Breaking Bad:What Christians can do about their public image
Eternity News’ Ben McEachen interviewed me about my new book Being the Bad Guys: How to Live For Jesus in a World That Says You Shouldn’t You can read it at the link below. FWIW I think Ben gets the tone I am trying to get across. It seems important in a time in which […]
A conversation with TGC Australia about my book
TGC Australia’s Andrew Moody interviewed me about my forthcoming book “Being the Bad Guys” recently. It all happened before the US shenanigans of last week, but it’s interesting how in our discussion we speak about how the church needs to move forward in these times. If you’re interested in a copy you can go to […]
Hey Franklin, that finger is pointing right back at ya!
A couple of Christmases ago I was accosted at the end of the service by a local pastor whose church was not holding a Christmas service. Not physically accosted, just verbally, so let’s not blow this thing up. But it got a bit too grinchy for my Christmas Day, and I veer towards the grinchy […]
(Guest blog post): The poor who give versus the rich who sell
How come my friends in Glasgow were poor but they gave me their stuff, but my friends in Perth are rich and they sell me their stuff? A few months into our new life in Perth in 2012 our 10 year old made that astute observation. Now, almost 9 years into our life in Perth […]
Why get an Awomen to do an Amen’s job?
Just when we thought we had reached peak stupid with the manner in which many right-leaning Christians in the US were viewing the Messiah, er, I mean the President, we find out that there is indeed another summit beyond the lofty clouds of a Democrat in the White House. Rep Emanuel Cleaver, an ordained minister […]
Five Reasons to Buy My Book
Okay, so last week I gave five reasons not to buy my book and the reverse psychology seems to have worked (evil genius that I am). So today I am going to pitch you five reasons why you should buy my book. If you don’t already know, it comes out Feb 1st and I am […]
Five Reasons Not to Buy My Book
So my book Being the Bad Guys: How to Live for Jesus in a World That Says You Shouldn’t officially comes out in a month – Feb 1st. And I can’t wait. Hey, maybe you can’t wait either. Not that you have to. From what I hear, anyone who pre-ordered it a month ago from […]
This week we leave Providence Church after ten years ministry
This week – this past Sunday in fact – we left our beloved Providence Church network after a decade of life and ministry in a church setting that morphed from three households and thirty six people, to three churches (one starting in a month) with five congregations and some 500 people. And it’s painful to […]
2020: The Year of Evangelical Exposures
It’s been the year of evangelical exposures. I have grown weary of opening social media or an online journal and reading of yet another trainwreck in “Big Eva”. I finished this year as I began it, as a guest on the podcast of the admirable Julie Roys, a US Christian independent journalist who has been […]
2020: The Year of Grinchianity
While I think there have been some fantastic Christian responses to what is going on in the world throughout 2020, it’s certainly been the year of what I call “Grinchianity”. Grinchianity – a peculiar form of Christianity which is suspicious of everything (think COVID19, tracking apps, masks, anyone not voting a certain way), seems to […]
The Black Toenail Award and Christmas re-gifting
Every year my run club hands out a perpetual trophy called The Black Toenail Award. It’s for the club’s best performer during the racing season, and throughout 2020 that trophy has sat proudly on my bookcase. Why black toenail you ask? Because as every runner knows, the constant pounding of your toes into the front […]
Some other stuff I’ve been doing this week
Life’s been busy. Our church has been searching for a new senior pastor so that process has taken up a lot of my time. I’m also in the throes of writing PR articles for the promotion of my book, Being The Bad Guys, which you can pre-order here if you are in Australia, here in […]
Ellen Turns A New Page
Ellen Page, the brilliant young star of Juno, The X-Men franchise, and lately the Netflix series, The Umbrella Academy, is now Elliot Page, having announced that she is trans. I say “she” advisedly, as Page has now offered the preferred pronouns of “they/he” to the world to use. Elliot Page has presented to the world, […]
You Do You: Pleasure (Bible Shots Video)
I’ve been speaking for City Bible Forum’s Bible Shots in Sydney. Well I’ve been Zooming in as we can’t leave the state of Western Australia at the moment to go to NSW without being pinged with a two week quarantine on the way back. The series is called You Do You, and each week I […]
Weekly Roundup
Here’s some stuff from me in my role at Third Space, as well as some other articles worth having a read of, including a superb essay by former SAS soldier, Federal Politician, and a friend of mine, Andrew Hastie. First up, David Robertson and me with another The Kitchen Table, discussing the idea of whether […]
Victorian Conversion Therapy Legislation: destined for the baddest guys of all – us!
From tomorrow in the state of Victoria in Australia, all that you will have to do to become badder guys than you are today is to stay exactly where you are. Don’t shift in your thinking around biblical sexual ethics. Don’t move. Just stay orthodox and let the Victorian Government Legislation do the shifting for […]
Being the Bad Guys: book preorder now available
My book, “Being the Bad Guys: How to Live for Jesus in a World That Says You Shouldn’t” can be pre-ordered now. Here’s a short video giving the intel on what it’s about: Preorders in the US here Preorders in the UK here Preorders in Australia here
Guerrilla Cultural Warfare
The Culture War threatening to tear the West apart has become guerrilla warfare. Once confined to demarcated battlefields such as university settings and political houses, in which all of the combatants were recognised soldiers, it is now being fought street fighting door to door, house to house. And increasingly dining table to dining table, family […]
The push to define conversion therapy as everything and anything
If pastors and other Christian ministry workers were left in any doubt as to whether any orthodox teaching on sexuality is being targeted by bans on conversion therapy in Australia, they could look no further than this recent article from the ABC. As the force of the article shows, the target of governments like Dan […]
Biden our time for a saviour
I put this comment up on Facebook this week and it seemed to resonate: With Biden set to win his declaration that there will be no red or blue states, just a United States is noble and irenic. But misplaced nonetheless. The divisions in the US (around the West for that matter) are deeper than […]
The time that Basil Zempilas thought the game was over.
Well by the time you are being threatened with sexual violence, your home has been graffitied, and your wife has been forced to shut down her Instagram account, you may begin to wonder whether life in the public square is for you. Well that’s just what has happened to the newly minted Perth Lord Mayor, […]
Totalled Church
Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way. Leo Tolstoy With apologies to the great Russian writer, this statement at the start of his masterpiece Anna Karenina gets it exactly the wrong way around. There is in fact a depressing sameness about unhappy families and the fall-out that results from this […]
a shout-out to the meddling kids: the Age of the Unmasking
It feels like the end of a Scooby Doo episode. An unmasking of sorts. Later this afternoon, Perth Australia time, a report will be released by the remaining elders of The Crowded House network in Sheffield UK. The report, commissioned by those elders, and carried out by the national safeguarding review organisation in the UK, […]
“No Sauce Please, We’re Expositors”
My favourite theological college lecturer tells of the time he was doing his PhD at Durham University when he was asked to preach on Romans at his local church. Slightly rushed, slightly distracted he said “Yes”. So on the Sunday he dutifully got up to preach. He scanned the crowd and there sitting waiting to […]
Curry Preaches Love, but gives Love curry
US Episcopal Bishop Michael Curry might have sparkled with Markle in a sermon about love, but he’s just given curry to William Love, the bishop who refused to allow his diocese to preside over same sex marriages. William Love has resigned as bishop rather than take his Albany diocese through a long and protracted legal […]
Noah (without the naughty bits)
Is this the official version? A good friend of mine who I run with regularly, recently PM-ed me that question in relation to this picture: Turns out her daughter is fascinated with her Noah story book. Turns out a lot of other kids are too, (along with books about dinosaurs). There are heaps of great […]
So my first book has gone to print
Last night my editor from The Good Book Company contacted me to say that the book I have been writing has gone to the printers. Whoop whoop! And it’s ready to pre-order if you want to do that. The title? Being the Bad Guys: How to Live For Jesus in a World that Says You […]
Gay marriage, gambling, and good deeds in the age of disappointment
The decision by Lotterywest to reject a grant application to assist the community outreach food program at tennis legend Margaret Court’s church on the basis of its public stance on same sex marriage, is not really all that surprising. Although Court herself is disappointed. Why is it not surprsing? Because it’s a sign of the […]
COVID exposed, but didn’t cause, the mental health tsunami
The mental health tsunami that we are experiencing in this COVID-era world in Australia was not so much caused by the virus, as revealed by it. Just as a tsunami runs for hundreds of kilometres in deep water without drawing too much attention to itself, before piling up in a huge wave as it reaches […]
The only thing worse than an immoral alley cat President? An evangelical one!
When the comments section in The Times of London about the latest craziness (Trump having COVID) contains this thread … … you know we’re in for interesting times. An evangelical Christian is worse than an amoral, “do whatever it takes” President. “Not a good look“! Hmm. And that’s in The Times, which generally weeds out […]
It’s official: Elite sport is willing to crack a few eggs (and your daughter’s head) for the sake of diversity
“Participation in sport is a human right” With that, quite frankly ludicrous, quote the Australian Sex Discrimination Commissioner, Kate Jenkins, welcomed the announcement by nine elite sports bodies in Australia, to the inclusion of trans athletes in their elite team should they meet the standard. (Oh and should their testosterone levels be low enough at […]
Goliath versus Goliath
The debate proved without a shadow of a doubt that Trump versus Biden was Goliath versus Goliath. Not that both men proved to be a giant for their side, or indeed a champion of anything. The debate was abysmal. It was Goliath versus Goliath because both men employ the tactics of the Philistines at war. […]
What if the church wasted the COVID crisis by not prepping for a more hostile shutdown?
Here’s a thought: What if the church wasted the COVID crisis? And I’m not simply talking about church preference. Nor am I talking about don’t simply talk about what the better model for evangelism, mission and pastoral care might be. I’m talking about whether we wasted an opportunity to prepare ourselves for a far more […]
Marathon#6: A Chasing After the Wind
I have seen all the things that are done under the sun, all of them are misty, a chasing after the wind. (Ecclesiastes 1:14) Windy. It was going to be windy. The forecast ten days out from Marathon#6, with me in the form of my life going into it, and it was going to be […]
Red Rope Christianity
Flying. Remember that? I flew a lot in 2019 for my job, mostly interstate within Australia (which admittedly is a big place), but also some international flights. And on Virgin flights my seat of choice was 8C. A Goldilocks seat. Not too far forward. Not too far back.Just right. And an aisle seat so that […]
What do progressive governments have in common with anti-vaxxers?
When it comes to trusting science to guide decisions around sexuality, progressively minded governments around Australia have a lot in common with anti-vaxxers. Form your narrative first, decide where you want this thing to land, and then search for the “science” to back up your clearly unsustainable position. In other words, ignore the science and […]
Aussie missionary to UK, Josh Williamson, was free but unwise.
The Brisbane-born pastor who is facing calls for his deportation from the UK back to Australia, over his public comments praising the cancellation of the Cornwall Pride event on a public Facebook page event has acted unwisely. If Josh Williamson is deported – which seems an unlikely scenario – then he should give some time […]
I heard a rumour: segregation is back
There’s an incredible, and moving, scene in the second series of Netflix‘s wayward superheroes comic book adaption, The Umbrella Academy. One of the superpower family of the academy, Allison Hargreeves, who is lauded in 2019 as a successful Hollywood black actor, is transported from New York to early 1960’s Dallas. She walks into a cafe. […]
Waxing lyrical about Cobra Kai: a reality kick to the face for X-Gens
Where are they now? X-Gens once trawled their old yearbooks wondering what their class mates were up to, and asking themselves, “Did I ever look that young?” Now of course, X-Gens just cut to the chase and stalk their old classmates on Facebook, ramping up the creepy and dialling down the mystery. Fatter, older, balder. […]
A funny thing happened to Adele on the way to the Notting Hill Carnival
So Adele decided to put her hair in Bantu knots, and wear a Jamaican flag bikini for the annual Notting Hill Carnival in London. And sent Twitter into meltdown. Not because she’s skinny now. Not because she’s put on weight now. No, those things are so pre-COVID-19 outrages over Adele. This time it was for […]
Some stuff about sour dough and COVID vaccines, the death of religion, and the state of education
I”ve been a little busy recently with other work stuff, so not as much blog posting with material specifically for stephenmcalpine.com. But I do have some stuff from my Third Space musings, and will be posting in the future around the trend away from city living (a series that I started last week about the […]
Netflix: Too Cute by Half
Remember the good old days when the likes of Target and Walmart were being hounded by both sides of the political spectrum for sexualising young girls with their ranges of hot pants and crop tops? For one side it was the industrial capitalist machine at work, pulling out all stops at making a buck. For […]
The suburb is dead: Long live the suburb
Reports of the suburb’s death are greatly exaggerated. The suburbs of the western nations have long been the whipping boys of many a book, many a play or movie, many a church planting conference. And many a city dweller. The suburbs are where you went to die, if not physically, then certainly spiritually, as Dave […]