The UK TV series HUMANS (the A” is upside down) from a few years ago was a cracking insight into the world of AI, in a near future UK setting. Humanoids are synthetics or “synths” as they are known, and they have been created that are remarkably real, and they do the bulk of the […]
Author: stephenmcalpine
Jesus, Evangelism and Our Mindarie Marina Holiday
We had a staycation this year for our summer holiday. In recent years we’ve meandered south of Perth a couple of hundred kilometres to the more temperate part of the state, and done the beaches, restaurants and wineries in a milder summer than Perth will receive. This year though, fed up with two years of […]
Our Dads Are All Dying. So What Are We Learning From It?
It’s six years ago today since I conducted my father’s funeral. A bittersweet experience to be sure. Dunno where that time went. But here’s the thing, I’m at that age where the dads of so many of my friends are dying. offhand I can think of five recently, In fact I am starting to count […]
Was The Pope a Catholic?
With the death of Pope Benedict XVI the Roman Catholic Church lost one of its great intellectuals. Not merely of recent years, but across the centuries. He truly was an amazing man with an amazing mind. His understanding of the cultural pressures those of faith face today was equally great. He saw the enervating nature […]
You’ve Completely Caught Up For Now
So I was scrolling Facebook when I got this message: Wow! You mean like, completely caught up? Well, for now at least. But hang on a minute, it’s telling us that ‘Something went wrong”. You’ve completely caught up for now, because something went wrong. In other words, we need to keep you chasing something. If […]
Christian Foster Parents, Gay Children and Six Thousand Dollars Worth of Hurt Feelings
Nearly three years ago, right before the pandemic locked down my home state and there were more important things to worry about, I wrote about the case of a Western Australian couple who had been rejected as short term foster carers by a government funded adoption agency. You can read that article here. The case […]
Andrew Thorburn Vindicated (and before Jesus returns too!)
If there’s one thing we know as Christians is that we won’t always get vindicated in this age. The slurs and opprobrium may well stick this side of the Parousia, and we know that there have been millions of Christians who have suffered greatly for the sake of the gospel, including the loss of their […]
Christian Word of the Year: Winsome
So here’s me choosing my Christian Word Of The Year. Drum roll please, “The Christian word of the year is WINSOME!” Taa-dah! That’s right, winsome! It’s everywhere you look at the moment. So please step forward “winsome” and take a bow. You’ve been over-used, over-realised, under-appreciated, over-stated, undered and overed, and whatever else can happen […]
When Voluntary Assisted Dying Becomes Coercive Assisted Dying
The voluntary assisted dying (VAD) push in Australia is set to win the aesthetics of the ethical war, as it inevitably does elsewhere. And the latest stoush with the Catholic Church over comments by Brisbane Archbishop Mark Coleridge, who warned that the last rites may be withheld from those who undertake VAD has ramped up […]
The Manual: Being A Good Man Isn’t Automatic
Australian author and church leader Al Stewart has done us a great service with his book The Manual: Getting Masculinity Right. The subtitle says it all. A lot’s been wrong with masculinity. Or perhaps a lot has been said to be wrong about masculinity. Or perhaps it’s both. Al’s book cuts through the toxic masculinity […]
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