Christ Church Huntingdon Blog

I saw a newspaper cutting recently. It was taken from the Tacoma News Tribune, a local Seattle based newspaper way back in 1953. The article asks about the telephone of the future. Let me quote from this 1953 article, it’s not too long (remember that it’s nearly 70 years old)…   “Mark R Sullivan, San Francisco, president and director of the Pacific Telephone and Telegraph company, said in an address on Thursday night (1953), “Just what form the future telephone will take, is of course, pure speculation. Here is my prophecy: ‘In its final development, the telephone will be carried about by the individual, perhaps as we carry a watch today. It probably will require no dial or equivalent and I think the users will be able to see each other, if they want as they talk. Who knows but what it may actually translate from one language to another?’” Well I think that 70 year old guess about the future of the phone is pretty spot on. My mobile phone can be carried around, allo...

 As I write this Thought for the Day I'm sitting in Coneygear Park, the sun is shining, I can hear the birds, and the world feels a whole lot brighter than it did just a couple of months ago. I want to talk to you this morning about staying young. I don't know how old you think I am, judging by my voice, but I'm actually only 24. According to the woman on the checkout at Aldi who asked to see my ID, I look like I'm 16, which is just past the point of being a compliment in my opinion. But we all want to look young, to fight the effects of aging on our body. The cosmetics industry worldwide is huge, and though it used to be just celebrities who paid through the nose for, well, nose jobs or other kinds of plastic surgery, it's now something members of the general public will pay thousands for. And it's not just women as stereotypes would have us believe - it's men too! A friend at church was telling me about a guy he works with who's getting Botox...

A few music loving listeners among us today may know the name Ralph McTell, a singer songwriter who’s been performing folk songs since the 60s. Probably most of us have heard of his most famous song, the Streets of London . I’ve asked Mark to play it at the end.  “Oh, let me take you by the hand and lead you through the streets of London. I'll show you something to make you change your mind”. It’s about a song in which Ralph lyrically leads us through the streets of London to meet a few characters that have fallen on hard times.  The old man in the closed down market kicking up the papers with his worn out shoes, the woman carrying her home in two carrier bags.  It’s a moving story which has lasted in the UK memory for now 52 years. In the song Ralph shows us these characters facing poverty and homelessness and effectively says, don’t think that everything is bad and lonely, compare yourself to these guys and you’ll see you have so much. Not a bad reminder. What...