THE Grand Orange Lodge of Scotland is worried about religious intolerance and, in all honesty, so am I.
THERE’S a stunning new mural nearing completion in Glasgow. Scaling the full height of a building in the city’s High Street, the artist Smug has created a beautiful depiction of St Enoch cradling her baby, St Mungo, and there’s something quite breathtaking about the towering tenderness of the image.
A FRIEND of mine insisted recently that I watch circus extravaganza The Greatest Showman, a movie I was sure I would hate. It is a musical and I’m not a great fan; I am not a cheerleader for fantastical depictions of a magical world where people are accepted for all their weird and wonderful flaws. It’s how I would love the world to be, but as a realist I get annoyed at Hollywood exploitation of such things. It’s easy to sex these things up, but it doesn’t translate into real life.
ARE we human beings on a spiritual journey or spiritual beings on a human journey? The question has been mused upon by countless philosophers, religious observers and psychologists, and to explore it requires taking an insightful, inquisitive look at one’s own beliefs and ideas.
THE case of Aurelia Brouwers has been back in the news recently, as debate continues about the decision to grant the 29-year-old the right to euthanasia – despite not being terminally ill.
YESTERDAY was that time of year again, when you log onto Twitter in the morning and find yourself swamped with the best words of wisdom that the great and the good of social media have to offer young people. It was, of course, exam results day.
IT shouldn’t come as a surprise that any discussion about freedom of speech on Twitter soon descends into an embarrassment, and I’m getting tired of an underlying belief among some participants that utter idiocy is permissible simply because they are a citizen and can think whatever they like.
I WROTE a letter to Prime Minister Tony Blair when I was 11, back in 1997, to suggest that people were wrong when they believed there was “no room” in Britain to house asylum seekers: in the innocence of my youth I pointed out that the Royal Family had a lot of palaces and land, and there would probably be quite a lot of room there.
I CAN still remember a time when Twitter was brilliant. When I began using it in around 2011, it felt vibrant and bright. There was a real novelty to the nature of the interaction – unlike Facebook, which brought real-life relationships into the virtual world, Twitter was about building bonds with complete strangers based on shared interests. In just 140 characters, as it was then, users gradually found kindred spirits around the world.
AS chaotic as the world is, you have to at least be able to imagine a better future if there is to be any hope for one. It’s not always easy, but amid crisis you must maintain an eye for opportunity, for a way to take a bad situation and create a better one from it.
