Plain Truth UK

Spring 2012
Random Acts of Kindness p6

Approaching the light p16
1 No God please were British! p10 Supporting lives in their darkest of times p14 Hmm p23 Summer 2011 TheP lain Truth
by Mary Hammond
A magazine of understanding
Sometimes, less is more

(Or: In some instances or occasions, it gives more gravitas and insight for a statement or explanation to be short, concise and comprehensible.)
Issue 46, Volume 75 Spring 2012 Editor Mary Hammond Consulting Editor John Halford Design Plain Truth Studio Copy Editor Jane Bravo The Plain Truth, P.O. Box 4421, Worthing BN14 8WQ. Tel: (01903) 602107. Fax: (01903) 602128. Advertising sales: Paula Taylor. Tel: (01903) 604342. E-mail: mail@plaintruth.co.uk The Plain Truth began publication in 1934. This edition appears four times a year, as resources allow and follows a non-denominational editorial policy. The Plain Truth is an independent charity. Company Registration No. 4619778. Registered Charity No. 1098217. The Plain Truth (Ltd) is a company limited by guarantee. Copyright 2012 The Plain Truth. The Plain Truth is a registered trade mark. Printed in England by Newman Thomson, Burgess Hill, West Sussex. Unless noted otherwise, scriptures are taken from The Holy Bible, New International Version, copyright 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission. Trustees: Sarah Anderson David Gibbs JP John Halford Rev Roy Lawrence Peter R Sheppard (Chairman)
Cover story
6 Random Acts of Kindess From a small, scribbled note, a worldwide movement emerges, showing love one toward another.
Cover photo courtesy The Kindness Offensive Archive.
friend recently sent me a clipping those who sought to discredit him and embracing love toward God and our fellow man. from a local church parish An initiative with a simple beginning magazine. The piece was both Our Spring issue focuses heavily on the subject of humorous and quite profound. Heres showing unconditional kindness (love) toward those in our communities through its cover article Random Acts what it had to say: of Kindness. An initiative that started off with a simple act There are 66 words in the Lords has spread like wildfire into an international movement, motivating and engaging tens of thousands of people with a Prayer. The Ten Commandments heart for showing kindness to others. contain 179 words. But the European And on page 9 of this issue, you can read how one simple good deed by a working mother to her sick friend has Unions regulations for the sale of resulted in a marathon of kindness that has catapulted her cabbages have no less than 26,911 into the spotlight of the media. Manners and thanks go hand-in-hand on pages 19 words!
Articles
9
Caths cakes cause a stir! Read what happened when a good deed was done for a sick friend.
10 No God please were British! Is Christianity under siege across our nation? 12 St Columbas Ladder Connecting earth to heaven its a bit like Jacobs ladder! 14 Supporting lives in their darkest of times Through books, Bibles and holiday breaks, this charity has given support over five decades. 16 Approaching the light Should Christians really feel threatened by new scientific discoveries? 18 The Plain Truth Interview Keith Baker, CERN nuclear physicist. 20 An anniversary message Celebrating a decades journey in Christian publishing. 21 The Plain Truth Reader Survey The results are in.
Sometimes it seems that we feel a great need to try and explain things at length or with lengthy words when all thats often required is a simple explanation. You may have come across a much-quoted phrase from the great Albert Einstein, one of the most famous scientists of the 20th century. He said: If you cant explain it simply, you dont understand it well enough. He was quite right. And wasnt that how Jesus himself explained the underlying simplicity of the law to the self-righteous teachers of it the Pharisees. Those who were determined to trip him up with their questions about its application.1 Their righteousness in their own eyes was through their strict adherence to no less than the 613 laws of the Torah. So when one of the Pharisees who the Bible describes as an expert in the law2 , posed the question: Which is the greatest commandment? there is every chance he was expecting a complicated and maybe lengthy response. Love Godand love your neighbour, came Jesus reply. All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.3 Simple. And what a great formula. One which we aim to follow through the pages of The Plain Truth. Exploring how we can show love to God and mankind through our everyday thoughts and actions. We try to explain the Christian message in simple language, played out in everyday situations, problems and issues each of us face. Echoing the response Jesus gave to
and 20 of the magazine. Our Chairman has an anniversary message to all our readers on page 20, where he highlights our tenth year in the publishing of The Plain Truth. Whilst on page 19 one of our regular columnists campaigns to bring back manners in his View from the High Street. Of course, no issue of The Plain Truth would be complete without an article or two looking at topical events making the news as we go to press. With the publication on 27th February of a report Clearing the Ground4, the subject of the need to reform the law to protect the right of Christians in the UK will be one that will gain much interest and media coverage in the weeks and months ahead. Christianity under siege is the same topic explored in the article by ever-popular author Gethin Russell-Jones in his thought-provoking piece No God please were British on page 10. And for those of you with a particular interest in science, John Halford gives a fascinating account of his recent visit to the CERN Super Collider in Geneva, Switzerland. He tells how we appear to be on the verge of exciting new discoveries that could force us to rethink how we look at the natural world. We hope that through our pages, weve brought you another issue of The Plain Truth that will inform, educate, inspire, encourage and motivate you on your Christian journey. As simple as that.
1 2 3 4 Matthew 22:15-22 Matthew 22: 35 Matthew 22: 37-40 Clearing the Ground, by Christians in Parliament can be downloaded at www.eauk.org/articles/reforms-needed-to-protect-rights-of-christians.cfm
DONATIONS: Although we do not charge a subscription price for The Plain Truth, we are grateful to any readers who are able, through donations, to support our desire to bring spiritual knowledge and understanding to our increasingly secular society. Cheques should be made payable to The Plain Truth and sent to PO Box 4421, Worthing, BN14 8WQ. You may also make an on-line credit card donation via www.plain-truth.org.uk
You can read this issue as well as previous issues of The Plain Truth on our website: www.plain-truth.org.uk
Regular features
2 4 Editorial Letters to the Editor
19 A view from the High Street 22 First Break

All photographs in this issue supplied by iStockphoto.com unless stated otherwise.
23 Hmm...
The Plain Truth Spring 2012
Spring 2012 TheP lain Truth
The Plain Truth Letters
Why we publish
Dear Readers, The Plain Truth is a Registered Charity (No 1098217) which produces a nondenominational magazine, aimed at readers of all faiths or none to inform and educate them on issues affecting our everyday lives from a Christian perspective. Our goal is to provide our subscribers with food for thought. The Plain Truths contributors come from many Christian backgrounds. Distributed free of charge, The Plain Truth provides its readers with a balanced spiritual diet. Published four times a year, The Plain Truth addresses topics such as family relationships, care of our environment, depression, preparing our children to become responsible members of society and many other similar topics from a Christian perspective. Regular features explore the books of the Bible and examine aspects of the Christian faith. Currently, with a circulation of around 8,000 in the UK and an estimated readership of 25,000, The Plain Truth is a valuable source of information and its articles are frequently used as a basis of sermons and assembly material for many denominations and schools across the country. We hope to be able to continue publishing The Plain Truth as long as resources allow. We are always grateful for the donations from our readers who share our vision and help us make The Plain Truth freely available to all who want it.
There is a topic I would like to have discussed in a future issue of the magazine. It is the question of what happens to us when we die. Well meaning Christians try to console those left behind by saying that their loved one is enjoying the delights of heaven. Surely this is wrong. Doesnt the Bible say that the dead sleep until Jesus comes again when the true Christians will inhabit this earth with Jesus as king? There is no preferential treatment for anyone, certainly not for saints of any denomination who will be sleeping the same as the rest of the dead. Mrs M T, Maidstone John Halford covered this very subject quite extensively in his lead article You say goodbyebut then what happens when we die? in our September November 2008 issue. In his article, John states that The Bible does not really answer the question of what happens to us immediately after we die. But he goes on to say, It is as if God is saying Dont worry about it. Leave it to me. I have things under control. Death is an enemy, but it is the last one you will ever face. Rather, the emphasis of scripture is on something far more exciting the resurrection of the body to what theologian NT Wright has called the life after life after death, in a new heaven and a new earth. If anyone hasnt had the opportunity to read this article and would find it helpful, then please let us know and well send you a copy. (And weve already put one in the post to you Mrs MT.)
In the last issue of The Plain Truth, we included a Reader Survey at the end of the magazine. Of the very many completed forms that were returned, were giving space on the letters page of this issue to hear what you have to say. (A full summary of the Survey Results can be found on page 21.) But heres a selection of comments from some of you: I love The Plain Truth as it is not too religious and puts the Christian message just right. Mrs G, Preston As a lay preacher I have used some of the articles and parts of articles, in services and also in house groups and fellowship meetings. Response has been generally very positive and helpful. Mr KL, Norwich The Plain Truth is better than ever! But I hate it when you publish articles suggesting Christianity is the only way to God. I use your articles etc as Im an R.S. teacher in a 6th Form college. Ms AM, Cheshire I like to read positive, uplifting articles. There is so much negativity in newspapers and a lot is simply untrue and misleading. Mr B, Tunbridge Wells Our survey showed that 72% of all readers listed inspirational stories as one of their favourite subjects covered in The Plain Truth. And with 81% of all responses also citing testimonies and stories as some of the most-read articles, well be sure we keep them coming! I enjoy The Plain Truth for its clear unchurchy and varied content. Good for sharing. Mr JB, Devon I like those articles that explain commonly misunderstood Bible passages like those that Colin Macdonald wrote. Mr RB, California Your magazine has had a profound influence on my life. Long may you put in print the simple understanding words of life. Mr DP, West Yorks
Reader Survey comments
Thank you for a Christian magazine that can so easily be shared with nonChristians. This one (Winter 2011/12) was in my opinion the best yet! Ms KG, Wicklewood And we were delighted to discover that just over half of you (50.79%) pass your copy of the magazine onto someone else after youve finished with it. I like your non-denominational policy. It is good to be challenged and to be presented with differing points of view and understanding. Mrs R, County Durham I feel Christianity is being denigrated and scorned by many so-called opinion formers today. Miss S, Wallasey Even amongst Plain Truth readers, only 13.76% of you felt Christianity had a positive image in the UK today. I have read it for many years and I like the fact that the articles are for everyone not just on Christian issues but families, depression, children, Jews, etc. Mr T, Salisbury I found The Plain Truth by chance in 1972 when I was out buying cigarettes! I was astonished by its content. It opened my eyes to the Bibles message previously a dusty, misunderstood book. Mr HR, Barnoldswick A feeling of inspiration With my completed survey, Im enclosing a short poem that I wrote after a visit to the caves at Cheshire it was probably in the 80s. Many people who have read it say I should get it published. I am not a poet, but I did feel a strong inspiration to record my visit in this way at the time. Perhaps a religious magazine like The Plain Truth may consider printing it? Mr DC, Orpington Mr DC added a PS to his letter, asking us to excuse his handwriting as he was quite elderly at 91 years old. Poetry is hugely subjective, but I liked the poem he has written, which is reproduced in the next column. Tell me what you think?
A visit to the Cheshire Caves The echo of a footstep thundered across the silent years of eternity. Probing into the secret shadowed corners, the opaque darkness of the past. The murmur of a drop of water from some hidden cavern, slowly ripples across the vast emptiness. A silent, secret, tear torn from the very womb of creation. From a wall glistening with the endless weeping of a million lonely years. A womb lamenting for the lost image of a world it had created. Still bearing the scars from the torture and turmoil of the hour of birth. This towering roofless cavern, wrenched from the very heart of the earth. Twisted and ravished by the imprisoned fury of creation. Now a silent, empty cathedral. Silent save for the embracing, overpowering, unspoken words: In the Beginning God.
Copyright: Douglas Clifton
Send your letters to:

The Editor The Plain Truth PO Box 4421 Worthing West Sussex BN14 8WQ Or email the Editor: editor@plaintruth.co.uk Disclaimer: Although every effort is taken to ensure up-to-date and accurate information is reproduced in The Plain Truth, the publishers, authors and printers cannot accept liability for any errors or omissions. Articles appearing in The Plain Truth remain copyright of the authors and may not be reproduced without prior, written permission of the copyright holder and the publisher. Any applications for reproduction should be made in the first instance to the Editor at The Plain Truth. Any statement made or opinions expressed in articles represent the opinions of the authors and may not necessarily reflect those of the charity.
BOOK WINNERS
Scripture Union Guides Winners The winners of free 3-part Guides from Scripture Union as advertised in our Winter issue were: Mrs Irene Brown Mr Martyn White Mr D L A Holland Mr Martin H Birk Survey Free Book Draw Winner The winner, drawn from the pile of completed Reader Surveys was: Mrs Astrid Saul from Lurgan. We hope she will enjoy reading the selection of Christian titles we sent her recently.
Diamond Jubilee message

The Queen began celebrations to mark her Diamond Jubilee by publicly declaring her support for the established church. In her speech at Lambeth Palace on 15th February, she stated that the Church was commonly underappreciated despite the fact that it was woven into the fabric of this country. Her Majesty went on to comment how the Church had helped to build a better society. Speaking to an audience which included key figures from nine major religious traditions, she said that the Church of England has created an environment for other faith communities and indeed people of no faith to live freely. In responding to her speech, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, commented that faith was at the heart of the Queens understanding of her role, which he believed was a calling from God. He said, The personal faith to which you have so regularly alluded entails the conviction from God to do what you do and to be what you are.
by Mary Hammond
young couple requested West-End theatre tickets, two teenage lads dreamed of having red electric guitars and a loving dad asked for a special birthday party for his daughter and ten of her friends. Originally it had been TKOs intention to pick just a couple of wishes from the list and to try and make them happen. But, as they approached businesses to help grant the desires of those on their wish list, more and more kind companies opened their hearts and minds to the idea. Before long, each and every wish had been granted by their remarkable kindness. The lady with arthritis got her new fridge (thanks to Baumatic); the father, his kids and all their friends got to train with, then watch the Moscow State Circus from ringside seats; and the two teenage boys had their rock aspirations fulfilled when they got the red electric guitar of their dreams, sent over by Yamaha. When this little experiment was over, there was no doubt in anyones mind that something special had happened and that this was just the beginning! Since that summers day in 2008 TKO have turned into a vibrant group with thousands of volunteers and dozens of corporate sponsors. Together they have given away over 3.5 million worth of goods as well as having created lots of events and media coverage too. The story of their successful kindness initiative has been reported widely by the media and their story has attracted attention from figures such as Londons Mayor, Boris Johnson, to TV personalities like Fern Britton when they appeared on her Channel 4 show last year. But what was behind TKOs inspiration and what motivated them to start this initiative? This is what co-founder David Goodfellow had to say to The Plain Truth: There are several thematic ideas expressed in many philosophies, religions and cultures which inspired us. I feel that your readers would probably be most interested in our Christian inspirations and ideas. Two of our major influences were the books Unlock Reality and A Course in Miracles3. Both texts offer up the idea that there is nothing that Jesus did that we could not also achieve. Some Christians may be angered by this and see it as heresy or extreme egoism. But didnt Jesus himself say Great things have I done, greater things will you do. 4 Further, he refers to Our Father, who is in heaven, not my father, which, in my opinion, clearly indicates he saw a very meaningful level of equality between us all as brothers. So why are we not all doing miraculous great things (yet) if it were that simple? Well, Jesus also said according to your faith let it be done unto you5. To my mind he is suggesting that we set the limits of our own possibilities. If were not doing miraculous things it is only because we do not believe we can. But how do we build that kind of faith? It would seem that Jesus is suggesting that there is something almost magnetic about ones personal state of belief that draws those things asked for towards a person. Most people see this as an insurmountable obstacle and as a result simply ask or pray and hope that Jesus will do the rest. I think this is a shame, as this doesnt really work and relies on Jesus faith not our own. And it should be our faith that determines the outcome.
Recipient of TKO initiative. Photo: TKO archive.
Limited by our own expectations?
Therefore, as Gods chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Colossians 3:12
t all started back in 1982 in a restaurant in the beautiful San Francisco Bay town of Sausalito. An American author, Anne Herbert, scrawled the words Practice random kindness and senseless acts of beauty on a place mat.
From that small, seemingly insignificant act, the phrase began to appear on bumper stickers and gradually gathered momentum, challenging people across the States to show compassion and care to others. Fuelled by the publication in February 1993 of the title Random Acts of Kindness1, the attention of the media was focussed on the real-life examples of many thousands motivated by Anne Herberts initiative and whose stories appeared in the book. From being a modern-day good Samaritan to a stranded family to sending a dying child regular gifts and signing them from the Magic Dragon these stories show the great potential
mankind has in love one toward another. But this organised kindness movement didnt just stay over in the States. Fast-forward a decade and a half to our capital city and we find four Londoners: David Goodfellow, James Hunter, Benny Crane and Robert Williams on the kindness trail. This group of friends and like-minded young men headed out of their front door one day in August 2008 to see if they could make the world a better place. We all know what its like being approached by someone in the street who wants something from us, but what would it be like if we approached people in the street to ask them what would make them happy? Would it be a reasonable goal? Or even possible to make their dreams come true? We thought it was about time we found out if we could make a difference!, said David Goodfellow, one of the band of four.
Four founding members of TKO. Photo: TKO archive.
We started to think about this concept, and what happens and how we act when we do have faith albeit in mundane things. For example, when I lose my keys, I believe I will find them so I will look for them. I believe I can make a flying machine so I start building. Belief sparks action action creates inspired results. But believing you already have it, doesnt mean you sit back and wait for it to come to you you need to take action in order to take ownership of it. We decided to try out this Christian idea (amongst others), primarily to prove it wrong. But instead of asking companies Could you help us by sending a toy for this child?, we called and said Thank you for your help here is the address youll need to send that toy. Four years later and using this believing approach we have fed hundreds of thousands of people, distributed gifts to the sick, the elderly, children and homeless people. Accomplishments that simply seemed impossible when we first started have become a reality.
Ever forward-focussed
The experiment begins
Calling themselves The Kindness Offensive2(TKO), this group of friends were dressed in high-vis jackets, yellow hardhats and armed with a few placards announcing their quest. The group set up a table on Parliament Hill and stopped passing members of the public to ask what acts of kindness would make their day special. One lady asked for a blender, another older lady with arthritis wanted a fridge she could reach more easily. A
Stepping out in faith has certainly borne fruit for TKO in their pledge to show love, concern and kindness to others by their actions of giving through their philosophy. But they are not a group to reflect too long on past achievements theres a whole lot more kindness to be done. As this Spring issue of The Plain Truth goes to press, TKO are busily planning their next big kindness initiative a nationwide activity that will include teddy bears, the police and children in distress. Scheduled for the summer, Teddy Kindness will involve placing a teddy bear within each police car that can then be given to a child at risk of going into shock or trauma after a disturbing event. Originating in the States, this idea has shown that this simple act of kindness can be greatly
Continued on page 8
Continued from page 7
comforting and make the child less likely to suffer longterm problems. TKOs three-point constitution states in its second point that they never seek donations directly from the public. So again, this project will be funded by companies who can ably afford to support the initiative. We asked David Goodfellow What if any Plain Truth readers wanted to support any of your projects, are you really saying you dont want their money or help? Heres his reply: Yes, youre correct on the first point. We never seek donations from the public, neither do we shake buckets at any of our events or fundraise through our website. (Although anyone can sign up on our volunteering page to give of their time6 if that appeals to you.) The last thing we want is to be annoying. We have only ever
been funded by companies who can well afford to make donations. That being said, given a lottery winner, or someone who wanted to spend some of their good fortune perhaps thanking the world for it or creating a kindness event dedicated to a loved one we may consider making a kind exception and do something really beautiful for them! But our message to your readers is Be kind it costs nothing, makes you feel great and cheers people up. Next time you get the opportunity, just give it a try!
1 2 3 4 5 6 Random Acts of Kindness by The Editors of Conari Press, Published in the USA 1993, ISBN: 1-57324-853-3 http://thekindnessoffensive.com A course in Miracles, published by the Foundation for Inner Peace, 2007 (first published in 3 volumes, June 1976), ISBN 978-1-883360-25-2 (Hb). John 14:1214 Matthew 9:2829 http://thekindnessoffensive.com/volunteer
Photo courtesy Bruce Adams/Daily Mail/Solo Syndication.
Caths cakes cause a stir and bring a little happiness too!
CASE STUDY
TKO inspiring young minds
The Kindness Offensive Constitution

1. Helpful & Harmless We seek to place all our activity squarely within these guidelines. 2. Free to the Public We never seek donations directly from the public though everyone is welcome to join in the fun. (Check out the TKO volunteering page on their website: www.thekindnessoffensive.com if this appeals to you.) hed just been reading a newspaper story about the power of doing good deeds. But the closing question What is it that you could do for others? fell on deaf ears when Cath Webb came to the end of the article. It was last March; it had been a long, hard winter and Cath an English teacher at a Boys Prep School in the North West was feeling quite negative. My reaction to the question was that I couldnt think of anything and anyway, I had enough on my plate. A job, a husband, three boys, and if that wasnt enough, two cats and a hamster! All I wanted to do at that moment was to have a nice cup of tea and I certainly didnt want to do anything to change the world. I actually felt a bit annoyed after reading the article, said Cath from her home in Cheshire. But maybe the seed of a challenge had been sown. Just a few days later, Cath found out that a good friend of hers had been diagnosed with breast cancer. I really didnt know quite what to say to her, said Cath, so I baked her a Victoria sponge cake and left it on her porch with a note. On the
Cath Webb in her kitchen baking yet another cake.
way home she sent me a text which simply read: You can feed people with love. Stopped in her tracks That short, six-word message stopped Cath in her tracks. It made her think if that was the reaction from one person, then what an amazing thing it would be to replicate that action every day for a whole year! So she set herself the goal of making a cake a day to give away for the next 365 days. A freelance journalist friend of Caths heard of her goal about 200 days into the baking bonanza and suddenly, like wildfire, the news spread across the globe. From the Telegraph1, Daily Mail2 and BBC to radio stations in New Zealand everyone wanted to interview this sponge cake Samaritan. Caths challenge ends on her birthday on 6th April this year, so we caught up with her between cakes to see how she would be celebrating her marathon baking project and whether she regretted taking on such a mammoth task. On the final day Good Friday as it turns out I will be inviting my family and friends to bake a cake of their own and give it away and
TKO had wanted to work with kids for a while, but the right opportunity had never presented itself. Fortunately, an inspiring teacher from Hazelwick School contacted the group, to ask if they would be interested in giving a talk to their Year 7 students. Of course, they jumped at the opportunity! On May 14th 2010, TKO went to Hazelwick School for a day on Being the change you wish to see in the world. A talk was given about the history of TKO, and at the end the children were set a kindness challenge. Each child in the year was given 50p and told to do the kindest, most imaginative good deed they could think of with the money. This sparked a fun and creative kindness competition amongst the kids. One sellotaped the money to the inside of their favourite library book for someone to find, whilst others grouped together to buy lots of sweets to give out in the playground to their fellow classmates. The kids were still enthusiastically performing Kindness Offensive deeds weeks after TKO had left!
3. Kindness for Kindness Sake: Beyond being Helpful & Harmless, we have no criteria for who benefits from our work. If you are a human being from planet Earth, then wed love to brighten up your day and perhaps help you to do the same for others, as we have a history of doing with the charities we work with.
What kinds of things could you do? (Here are just a few suggestions.) Visit or phone someone whos ill or lonely. Encourage or thank someone. Be generous with compliments. Say something nice about someone. Smile at others. Write a note of thanks to someone. Bake someone a cake.
make someone smile. On the last day, wouldnt it be amazing if others around the country joined in and together we baked 366 (or more) cakes on just that one day to make someone smile? And if any Plain Truth readers felt like joining in it would be great and they could email me on that day at cathcakes@hotmail.co.uk,or read about what is happening on Twitter at @catherine_webb. As I am nearing the finishing line, I dont regret for one moment the year-long project. But it would not have been possible to keep going this long and stay positive and on track without the very many people who have stood on the sidelines cheering me along. Its certainly been a life-changing experience but Ive really enjoyed baking each and every cake along the way! If you plan to join Cath on her Cake Bake Finale on 6th April, then wed love to hear about it. (You might even send us a photograph too!)
1 www.telegraph.co.uk/foodanddrink/9005044/ The-sponge-cake-Samaritan-rises-to-thechallenge-of-spreading-joy.html http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/ article-2084478/Good-Samaritan-Teacher-plansbake-cake-day-year.html#ixzz1jZsXq5On
No God please were British

by Gethin Russell-Jones
Dawkins Foundation for Reason and Science. This organisation polled selfconfessed Christians in the UK, with a view to ascertaining the impact of faith on their daily lives. The results were hardly inspiring: Fewer than three in 10 (28%) cited a personal belief in the teachings of Christianity. According to the research, people were more likely to consider themselves a Christian because they were christened or baptised into the religion (72%) or because their parents were members of the religion (38%). When asked where they sought guidance in questions of right and wrong, only one in ten said it was from religious teachings or beliefs, with over half (54%) preferring to draw on their own inner moral sense. faiths, we are a Christian country, with an established Church in England, governed by the Queen. Christianity plays an important part in the culture, heritage and fabric of our nation. Public authorities be it Parliament or a parish council should have the right to say prayers before meetings if they wish. The right to worship is a fundamental and hard-fought British liberty. In sporting parlance it was Bone 1, Pickles 0. The game, however, is changing. Mr. Pickles is fast-tracking his new Localism Bill, adding new freedoms for town councils to decide whether to pray or not. But this is only one unseemly spat among many. And whilst Christianity may amass many allies, this venerable faith and its institutions are often perceived to be on the back foot. Plucky in defence but ineffective in attack. The impact of faith The churchs self-appointed inquisitorin-chief is the celebrated atheist, Richard Dawkins. Through books, lectures and TV programmes he has dedicated his life to exposing the superstitious folly of religious belief. His most recent foray into the realms of the supernatural came in the form of a survey undertaken on behalf of the somewhat grandly named Richard Only about a third (32%) of those polled said they believed Jesus was physically resurrected. Less than one in five (18%) admitted they did not believe in the resurrection, while half (49%) said they did not think of Jesus as the Son of God, with one in twentyfive (4%) doubting he existed at all. Sixty per cent said they had not read any part of the Bible independently for at least a year, while 37% said they had never or almost never prayed outside a church service. Almost two-thirds (64%) could not identify Matthew from a choice of four as the first book of the New Testament. Nearly half the respondents had not attended a church in the last 12 months. Richard Dawkins said the findings were a sign that Christianity was largely irrelevant, even to those who still label themselves Christian. Ouch! But at the same time as Dawkins biased and self-funded invective against the body of Christ, the Queen entered the trenches and fixed her bayonet.
visitor from a distant corner of the galaxy would be perplexed by the strange obsessions of British society. Men, largely men, chasing balls of various sizes might be unsettling. Eclipsed only by the hundreds of thousands of other men, largely men, shouting abuse at the ball chasers and each other. Technology, of course, would be a challenge to our intergalactic neighbours, as would language, but what would they make of religion? Observing the religious habits of Great Britain would be amongst the most daunting of tasks for any traveller. There are hundreds, if not thousands, of buildings with spires that most people dont attend. Inside, a range of rituals may be observed involving wine, bread, water, music and poor coffee. When asked, the people would say they are Christians, worshipping a person who lived several millennia ago. He died, rose again and now lives in the lives of his followers. Take away the spires and there are more buildings which house religious practices. Many of these house Christian worship rather different to their spired peers, but some are not Christian at all. And so our intrepid explorer would have to come to terms with Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, Bahai you get the picture. She might conclude that this is a very religious country. But she would be mistaken. A cursory trip to the fast vanishing phenomena of bookshops would persuade our friend that religion now has more enemies than friends in the UK. Any number of celebrity authors lining up to shoot the final bullet into Christianity. Christianity under siege Forgive my fictional folly, but I hope you get the point. Religion in general and Christianity in particular are under siege in these islands. Hardly a day passes without the churchs obituary being announced by somebody or other. Take for example a recent ruling of the High Court. A Bideford town councillor by the name of Clive Bone took legal action against this said council for allowing prayers during the formal agenda. Mr Bone, an atheist, stated that he was offended by this practice and that the council had no legal right to impose Christian beliefs on others. Spurred on by the National Secular Society, this objection was upheld by the court. The response was furious. Bishops, politicians and disinterested bystanders railed against the court for undermining centuries-old constitutional freedoms. Rejoicing in the name of Eric Pickles, the Communities Secretary vented his barely contained rage in the Daily Telegraph newspaper: While welcoming and respecting fellow British citizens who belong to other
In a speech at Lambeth Palace, she said that the Church of England was underappreciated and misunderstood. According to Her Majesty, the established churchs role, is not to defend Anglicanism to the exclusion of other religions. Instead, the Church has a duty to protect the free practice of all faiths in this country. The Church has helped to build a better society more and more in active co-operation for the common good with those of other faiths. She went on to say that faith acted as a spur for social action, and that religious groups remind us of the responsibilities we have beyond ourselves. Militant secularisation But the church has many curious allies. As Defender of the Faith, the Queen might be expected to say a kind word, but what of a Muslim Cabinet Minister? In an astonishing article in the Daily Telegraph, Baroness Warsi thundered against the political and intellectual elites seeking to sideline Christianitys public contribution. Baroness Warsi said that faith had been neglected, undermined and yes, even attacked by governments in recent years. You cannot and should not extract these Christian foundations from the evolution of our nations any more than you can or should erase the spires from our landscapes. But she went on to identify a sinister mood at work in UK society: My fear today is that a militant ularisation is taking hold of our societies. We see it in any number of things: when signs of religion
Left: Richard Dawkins, celebrated atheist.
cannot be displayed or worn in government buildings; when states wont fund faith schools; and where religion is sidelined, marginalised and downgraded in the public sphere. Britain is now a moral and religious battlefield. A once sleepy church is being roused by its critics and must regain her former confidence. And the credibility gap is considerable. Whilst many Britons are largely sympathetic to Christianity and two thirds of them still describe themselves as believers, there is widespread ignorance of the most basic elements of the churchs message. Those less favourable to the churchs cause only need to look at the appalling revelations of child sexual abuse that leak from certain parts of Christendom in order to feel deep revulsion. If the church is to recover her role as the nations conscience, then she must first put her own house in order. And presently this is unlikely.Driven by internal disputes about gay clergy and women bishops, the Church of England seems more interested in itself than the bewildered nation. And whilst it is heartening to see politicians and royalty eager to defend the rights and responsibilities of public religion, the time has surely come for Christians to seek a common voice when addressing the world. Against the splintering of the UK Christian scene, churches need to look beyond their own narrow interests and seek the common good. This surely has been the greatest benefit of the Alpha course, enabling churches of all hues to present basic Christianity; a faith that crosses borders and boundaries. Or consider the impact of Street Pastors and Foodbanks organisations which mobilise local Christians to reach out to the most deprived in the name of Jesus. I recently read that the voluntary sector in the UK is overwhelmingly dependent on Christians; hundreds of thousands of believers giving their time and money every week in service to the poor, diseased and lonely. No amount of clever disputation or mocking tones can compare to the power of kindness and compassion. Love in the end will silence all her critics.
10 The Plain Truth Spring 2012
Spring 2012 TheP lain Truth 11
St John tells us that some Greeks once approached Philip with the request Sir we would like to see Jesus.1 This should always be the starting point for our prayers. It is so easy not to see Jesus, to have a completely false picture of him. There are many of them around. For instance, some seem to think of him as a pale, unreal, stainedglass sort of figure, whereas the real Jesus was true flesh and blood, capable of experiencing the full range of human life. Others, perhaps misunderstanding the hymn Gentle Jesus meek and mild, have a by Roy Lawrence picture of a cissy-Christ, nothing like the man who drove the moneychangers out of the temple. Then there is the picture of the Christ who was a pillar of the middle class, which disregards the fact that many of the respectable people of his day made no secret of the fact that they wanted to get rid of him. By contrast there is the Che Guevara guerrillatype of Christ, who would have had no time for the idea of loving your enemies. Or how about the notion of a narrow-minded, puritanical Jesus which ignores the fact that when his enemies wanted to discredit him, they called him a glutton and a wine-bibber?2 But perhaps most popular, however, is the picture of a kindly, homespun philosopher, whom nobody could possible have wanted to crucify. But they did. If we follow St Columba, we will begin our prayers simply by looking at Jesus, and by taking care that it is the real Jesus we are picturing and not some bogus version of him. How do we ensure that our picture of him is as accurate as it can be? A good start is to see that we pay more attention to the Bible than to our own imagination Columba composed a number of memorable prayers. that we regularly look at him through the eyes of Matthew, You and I can benefit by using some of them today. They Mark, Luke and John. They do in fact all see him slightly include one which I like to call St. Columbas Ladder differently. this is it: To Matthew he is king of the Jews, great Davids greater Son. For Mark he is the suffering servant, a Lord Jesus we pray that we may always mysterious figure, essentially misunderstood, inexorably Behold you making his way towards the cross. Desire you Look upon you in love and For Luke, Jesus is Saviour of the world, reaching out to Long after you for your own sake. people of every nation, telling wonderful stories, offering Amen the Holy Spirit to all. For John, Jesus is the cosmic Christ,
Beholding Jesus
St Columbas Ladder
co-creator of the world with God the Father, offering life that is stronger than death to all believers. These are four different interpretations but they fit together perfectly, and we can augment them both by the insights we can expect the Holy Spirit to give us as we pray and from all we will learn from others who are perhaps further along the Christian way than we are. We will find ourselves learning not just from their words but from the fact that those who walk through life with Jesus gradually become more and more like him. This means we are sometimes privileged to see Christ in each other. There are several people who come into my mind as I write this paragraph. I am grateful for them all.
Desiring Jesus
olumba was an Irish saint who lived and worked in the sixth century AD. For much of his life he lived and worked in Scotland. His ministry brought about the conversion of many, including two kings. He founded a community on the island of Iona, which, though it lapsed during the days of the Reformation, has been restored and now involves Christians from a wide range of traditions.
After setting our eyes upon Jesus, we are ready for the second rung of St Columbas Ladder of Prayer. We must know and affirm just how desirable Jesus is. It would be wrong to say that when I was a boy Britain was a Christian country, but I think at any rate we knew that it would be a thoroughly good thing if it were possible for Britain to become a Christian country. We knew that Christian standards were desirable, that Jesus himself was desirable. One of the signs of this was that decent behaviour was often called Christian behaviour, that a good and kindly act was often called a Christian act. It was a loose and inaccurate way of speaking, but at any rate it was a sign that people thought that Jesus stands for the highest and the best. We can no longer take this for granted. The national presupposition now seems to be that you have a right to do your own thing and go your own way. If others do not like it, then that is tough for them. In Biblical terms we seem to have gone back to the days of the Book of Judges. We are told that at that time everyone did what was right in his own eyes. It is a phrase that recurs (Judges 17:6 and 22:25). The result was chaos. It still is! In our prayers it is so important that you and I should affirm the desirability of Jesus and that we should pray that society will come to do so too.
their sex, are called to be brides of Christ. This is because according to St Paul the whole Christian Church is Christs bride, a mysterious doctrine which he expounds in the Letter to the Ephesians, chapter 5, verses 25-32. So it was that in early editions of Hymns Ancient and Modern the hymn How sweet the name of Jesus sounds contained the words Jesus, my shepherd, husband, friend and both men and women were expected to sing them. Subsequent hymn books changed this to Jesus, my shepherd, brother, friend to avoid any sort of embarrassment, but St Paul might well have preferred the original words. Our prayers, then, should include an expression of our love for the Christ who has himself shown such amazing love for us, and this can bring us very naturally to the final rung on St Columbas Ladder of Prayer.
Looking upon Jesus with love
The third rung in St. Columbas Prayer Ladder takes us a stage further than just recognising that Jesus is desirable. There is a real sense in which Christian living is meant to be a love story, a recognition of Christs love for us and an expression of our love for him. Many people may know that when a woman becomes a nun, one of the traditional tokens of this is the giving and receiving of a wedding ring to show that she is now the bride of Christ. What may be less well known is that there is a sense in which all committed Christians, irrespective of
There is an old quotation. I cannot find its origin, but after hearing it many years ago, it has always remained in my mind: Take care, o man, on what you set your heart. For you shall surely have it. Initially I thought of these words as being distinctly scary. We tend to want so much that is shoddy and sinful. It would be awful to be saddled with it for all eternity. However, there is another side to the quotation. For those who set their hearts on Jesus, it becomes a wonderful promise. If we long after Christ, ultimately that longing will be satisfied. It will begin here and now, because by faith we can claim his promise today and tomorrow and every day. Lo I am with you always he pledges3. However, this is only part of the Gospel message. There is an even greater pledge. Within the mystery of eternity we are assured that faith will turn into sight. We have the promise of St. John that not only will we be enabled to see Jesus in all his glory but amazingly we shall become like him.4 In the words of another hymn, Faith will vanish into sight, hope be emptied in delight. It is a concept which stretches our minds to their absolute limit and it provides a fitting climax to St Columbas Ladder of Prayer. St Columbas Ladder is a bit like Jacobs Ladder, which we read about in Genesis 28: 10-17. Jacobs Ladder connected earth to heaven. In its own way St Columbas ladder seeks to do the same thing. Try it for yourself.
1 2 3 4 John 12:21 Matthew 11:19 Matthew 28:20 1 John 3:2
Longing after Jesus for his own sake
by Lin Ball
Specialist holidays
Supporting lives in their darkest of times
Another key area of what Torch offers is their programme of specialist holidays for people with sight loss. Many of these are run from their own Holiday & Retreat Centre in Sussex, with a handful taking place in other parts of the UK and Europe. Often those who attend return year after year, finding the centre a home from home where their disability is no barrier to full acceptance and inclusion. The programme offers a range of wonderful opportunities, giving people with sight loss the chance to relax on a beach, shop, attend the theatre, enjoy crafts and cookery, swim, ride a horse or even attempt an assault course!
International reach
ith one hundred people every day in the UK being given a diagnosis of sight loss, theres never been a greater need for companionship and support on that journey into the growing darkness.
Enjoying a Torch Trust holiday.
Bibles and magazines
A range of needs
Becoming blind isnt just about medical intervention, mobility aids or accessing benefits although those are important, of course. Its about being connected with others who will understand and care; about finding appropriate provision for new and changing needs; its about recognising that blind people, too, have spiritual needs. The charity Torch Trust is a Christian organisation which has been working with blind and partially sighted people for over 52 years. It began with one concerned but fairly ordinary couple, Ron and Stella Heath, opening their suburban home to young people who were blind, and trying to find creative solutions to the lack of Christian literature in braille, giant print and audio. Over the years, Torch has evolved into an innovative charity with a team of professional staff and dedicated volunteers operating from a purpose-built office with a production centre and recording suite in Market Harborough, Leicestershire.
The provision of accessible literature has always been a significant part of what Torch does. The literature team produces seven different magazines for blind and partially sighted adults and children which go out to readers in 100 countries. They also provide the Bible, Bible study material and devotional publications in a range of accessible formats. And they run the largest Christian postal lending library in Europe all free to registered blind and partially sighted people. Well over 100 new Christian titles are added to the Torch Library each year. Though the technology has moved on, the work remains true to its original vision, says Torch CEO Dr Gordon Temple. The aim of Torch Trust is to enable people with sight loss to discover Christian faith and lead fulfilling Christian lives. The Gospel is inclusive. Jesus was inclusive and went out of his way to include blind people, and those with other disabilities.
Torch also has an international reach, most notably working in Malawi and several desperately poor neighbouring African countries. Here the focus is again on providing accessible Christian literature and starting up support groups. Contacts built up over many years enable the distribution of targeted aid to blind people in these countries items such as white canes, braille machines and wheelchairs as well as basic medicines and foodstuffs. Although for many, blindness is a gradual process or a condition from birth there are also sometimes rapid onsets of sight loss that can be faith-testing, like that of Dr Trevor Stammers. Without warning, Dr Stammers, a GP and lecturer in bioethics, experienced retinal tears in first one and then the other eye, leaving him virtually blind. One day, sitting at my desk finishing some work on my computer, I simply lost the sight in one eye, he says. I was operated on the next day but the retina had been so badly damaged that the eye required filling with silicone and I was told it would take a while to Dr Trevor Stammers regain my sight and then about six weeks later the same thing happened to my second eye, leaving me totally blind for a few days. This is a relatively rare condition. But from the beginning my consultant was very upbeat about the ultimate prognosis and that has proved to be right in terms of gradually regaining my sight. Dr Stammers says he learned more about blindness in a few months than in decades of medical training. You never know how life is going to turn and this experience was a sobering lesson. It was incredibly frustrating not being able to read or drive especially reading, which I regard as one of lifes great pleasures. It was totally emasculating not to be able to use a microwave or kettle for myself. If I had not known that my condition was likely to be temporary Im sure I would have been quite depressed.
Malawi Fellowship Group for sight loss.
By what Dr Stammers calls a remarkable turn of events he came into contact with Torch Trust soon after he lost his sight. First, a friend who is a disability officer made a connection with Torch so that Dr Stammers could receive audio and large print books. And then some friends took him to the Christian Resources Exhibition in May and, amazingly, the first person he bumped into (literally!) was Dr Gordon Temple, Torch CEO. Dr Stammers spent most of the day with Gordon and around the Torch stand, meeting a number of blind and partially sighted staff and friends of Torch, which was a great encouragement to him. My faith has been tested by this experience, but not changed. I have never been a subscriber to the philosophy of life that if you are a Christian then life must run more smoothly quite the reverse. In the past, whenever I have been counselling a patient who I know sees life through the lens of a personal relationship with God, I have encouraged them to think about what God might be teaching them through their condition. Now, I had to ask myself this question! Thankfully, having a faith made my experience less of a major anxiety than it would have otherwise been. Being temporarily blind has given me a tremendous sense of gratitude to God for my sight. Just seeing again the sun shining through the trees can make me quite emotional.
Make contact
Acceptance and friendship
Keenly aware of the social needs of blind and partially sighted people, Torch runs over 100 Torch Fellowship Groups around the UK. The gatherings, usually monthly, focus on acceptance and friendship. Other kinds of social groupings for people with sight loss to discuss books together or meet via the telephone have been successfully piloted and are now being developed.
Whats available from Torch is for people of any faith or none. The organisation is especially keen to contact people like Dr Stammers going through sudden or gradual loss of sight. If you would like to find out more, do get in touch. Torch is also committed to encouraging churches to be more inclusive of disabled people, and produces a range of resources to that end. May 2012 sees the publication of a book by Gordon Temple and Lin Ball called Enabling Church, a resource to promote understanding of what the Bible says about disability and inclusion (published by SPCK). For more information: go to www.torchtrust.org Email info@torchtrust.org or call 01858 438260. Contact: Lin Ball, Media Team, Torch Trust.
by John Halford
feet in a circular tunnel 17 miles in circumference. Down there, protons (one of the smallest particles of matter) are accelerated to nearly the speed of light, and then redirected to smash into each other. I have a vague understanding of what happens when these particles collide, but I think it would be better to leave the explanation to someone who really knows what he is talking about. So we have included an interview with Keith Baker in this issue of The Plain Truth. By the way, dont feel bad if you dont fully understand it. It seems that no one does. I take comfort from the words of the Nobel Prize-winning pioneer of quantum mechanics, Niels Bohr, who admitted, If you are not completely confused by quantum mechanics, you do not understand it. Nevertheless, what we are on the verge of learning from the collider is likely to turn our understanding of the Universe on its head. As physicist Lisa Randall wrote, We are poised on the edge of discovery. The biggest and most exciting experiments in particle physics and cosmology are under way and many of the worlds most talented physicists and astronomers are focused on their implications. What scientists find within the next decade could provide clues that will ultimately change our view of the fundamental makeup of matter or even of space itself and just might provide a more comprehensive picture of the nature of reality.1 At CERN that excitement is contagious. It can be an exciting time for the rest of us too, as we look over their shoulders. Because surely the more we understand about the creation, the more we will appreciate its Creator. Could it be that discoveries that revolutionize our ideas about creation could also revolutionize our understanding of its Creator? Sadly, many people will see a threat in the very idea. We like to think we have God figured out, and when science comes up with something that challenges established ideas, the first reaction is to resist. Copernicus, Galileo, Newton and Einstein proposed ideas that blew the conservative doors off their hinges and opened up startling new levels of understanding. That might be about to happen again. Like theologians, scientists like to think they have got things figured out. But as they probe ever deeper into outer and inner space, they discover new levels of intricacy. There is still so much we do not know about our cosmos, even the small part that is available to experiments. Most of it is not. What scientists have labelled dark energy and dark matter make up 94 per cent of the Universe. They are beyond the reach of our senses and our instruments, but they have a massive impact on the small sliver of the cosmos we can investigate. What we do experience seems to be just a part of a greater reality. Are we just one of millions of other universes? Are there extra dimensions beyond those we experience? Is time linear, or do the past, present and future all happen at the same time? Could there be life even intelligent life elsewhere in the Universe? Einstein based his theories on the apparent fact that the ultimate possible speed is the speed of light, but recent experiments suggest this might not be so. These are hard ideas to contemplate, let alone understand.
Any human being will have difficulty, writes Lisa Randall, creating an accurate visual image of whats going on at the minuscule scales that particle physicists study today. The elementary components that combine to form the stuff we recognize as matter are very different from what we access immediately through our senses. Those components operate according to unfamiliar physical laws. As scales decrease, matter seems to be governed by properties so different that they appear to be part of entirely different universes.2
A threat to our beliefs?
Turning understanding on its head
Approaching the light

God, the blessed and only Ruler, the King of kings and Lord of lords, who alone is immortal and who lives in unapproachable light, whom no one has seen or can see. (1 Timothy 6:15-16.)
his is an exciting time to be a particle physicist. Especially if you are a particle physicist who believes in God, because we appear to be on the verge of exciting new discoveries that could force us to rethink how we look at the natural world.
CERN Super Collider, Geneva, Switzerland.
Recently I visited the CERN Super Collider in Geneva, Switzerland, as the guest of Dr Keith Baker a particle physicist who is also a committed Christian. Keith is a Yale Professor, who has also been involved with the cuttingedge experiments now being conducted using this amazing technological marvel carved into the rock beneath France and Switzerland. We watched the operators in the control room, which reminded me of Mission Control for a space mission. Which, of course it is. Except that these men and women are supervising a journey into inner space. The actual experiment is going on deep in the ground under our
New discoveries are always hard to explain, and just to talk about them takes us, as theologian and physicist John Polkinghorne observed, to the frontiers of language. In other words, we dont have the words to express what we think we might be trying to say. The easy way out is to dismiss new understanding as nonsense, and that, sadly, is the road that religion has often chosen. When scientific advances are seen as threats, the natural reaction is to attack and ridicule them. It need not be so. New discoveries simply give us deeper insight into the reality of the creation as God actually made it, not as we have assumed that it should be. There is no threat to God in scientific discovery; hes the one who made whatever is discovered. So why should believers feel threatened? When scientific language becomes inadequate to describe new frontiers in understanding, scientists sometimes find themselves resorting to language that sounds vaguely theological. Lisa Randall based the title of her book, Knocking on Heavens Door, on the idea that as we now have instruments that can accelerate particles to approach the speed of light, we are metaphorically knocking on heavens door. In metaphorical language of its own, the New Testament tells us, God dwells in unapproachable light. Whatever we discover about the intricacies and mysteries of the Universe, we will never discover God in it. However long and hard we knock on heavens door. Thats why God came knocking at our door, meeting us on our territory. God, in the person of Jesus, became one of us. For about thirty years he lived among us, showing us things and telling us things we could never indeed discover for ourselves. He showed us that behind the curtain of unapproachable light there is an awesome power, one that is not forever beyond reach. He showed us a Creator who knows us, loves us and, in Jesus, shares all that he is with us. The people who believed this before the scientific age found it exciting. We, who have the blessing of knowing so much more about the creation, should find it even more exciting. This is truly an exciting time to be a scientist and a Christian too.
1 Lisa Randall, Knocking on Heavens Door: How Physics and Scientific Thinking Illuminate the Universe and the Modern World, published by Bodley Head, September 2011, ISBN-13 978-1847920690. ibid.
So why collide hadrons? (And what are they, anyway?)

Plain Truth: Would it be true to say that you are on the leading edge when it comes to experiments in this field? Keith Baker: Yes. The most likely venue for new discoveries in all of science is at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN. And thats where I am. Ive been working at the LHC for just over 15 years. PT: What does the Hadron Collider do? Keith Baker: The Large Hadron Collider is a protonproton collider, that is, it collides hadrons. Briefly, hadrons are particles that have internal structure whereas the other class of particles leptons are structureless. For example, protons, neutrons, mesons are all examples of hadrons; they are made of quarks and gluons. Quarks and gluons are subject to the strong force and come together to form these hadrons. On the other hand, electrons, positrons, taus and muons are examples of leptons. As far as we know, these have no structure and their interactions are not governed by the strong force, only the weak and electromagnetic forces. With circulating proton beams, higher energies can more easily be achieved than if leptons are collided. And the higher the collision energy, the deeper is our probe of space and time. That is, the greater our chance of discovery. Using a stream of magnets, we send one beam of these protons one way and then send another beam of these protons the other way. Then, as they approach the speed of light, we make them collide at different points around the approximately 17-mile in circumference ring. We want to get to the highest energies we can, and make enough of these collisions so that these rare events that youre looking for can take place in a reasonable amount of time. The magnets can focus these charged particles and we can make the collisions happen wherever we want. And of course, we can have millions of collisions every second. We then analyze the results. Thats the collider in a nutshell. PT: Popular journalism has suggested you are looking for the god particle. However, scientists dont like that term, do they? Why not? Keith Baker: It implies that what were looking for will satisfy some deep religious question. But theres no connection there. We are looking for evidence that will explain some important gaps in our scientific understanding not theological. We have a theory thats called the Standard Model of Particle Physics and it describes everything we know about all the particles weve discovered up until now. Some people
THE PLAIN TRUTH
INTERVIEW
Dr. Keith Baker is a professor at Yale University and an experimental particle and nuclear physicist. He is a member of the experimental team working at the CERN Collider in Geneva, Switzerland. John Halford, our Consulting Editor, interviewed Dr Baker on behalf of The Plain Truth.
I
Higgs boson: An example of simulated data modelled for the CMS particle detector on the Large Hadron Collider.
m with William Wilberforce on this one. During his lifetime, this eighteenth century gentleman supported a range of causes, particularly the abolition of the slave trade. This, however, is not the object of my admiration in this article. Reader, I ask you to applaud posthumously with me his campaign to reform public behaviour. Specifically, his involvement with the Society for the Reformation of Manners. Now Im no Mary Whitehouse and I believe that freedom of speech should always take precedence over censorship, but Ive had enough. What, pray, is the cause of your disquiet, you might ask? Allow me to relate a few recent encounters. The first took place near to my home. Finding a spot to park my car, I gave way to someone who was just leaving. As this young couple moved away, I noticed a white plastic bag near where they had been stationed. Bursting full of paper and chips. It seems that they had partaken of food at a nearby takeaway and feasted in their car. They ended their banquet by disposing of their voluminous rubbish by throwing it out of the passenger window. The other three irritations are all linked. Driving around the city of my habitation, I have three times been overtaken on ordinary suburban roads with traffic approaching on the other side. You may gather from my tone that I am less than pleased; in fact I am greatly peeved. These things should not be. I fully recognise there are greater transgressions and of themselves these are minor misdemeanours. But my random examples are probably connected to a chain of other infringements being committed regularly across the country. Whatever happened to our manners? Human society is essentially made up of numerous unspoken contracts. In return for courteous, peaceable behaviour we can expect the same. Although not addressing the experience of urban living, Jesus commanded his followers to do unto others as they would have done unto them. My point exactly. Through limiting the darker side of our conduct, we make life more bearable for others and add to the currency of civilisation. Its give and take on everyones part. But I fear I sound like a middle-aged dullard, trying to recapture a golden age that was never there in the first place. Maybe. But I sense that our communal values are changing for the worse. On one end you have increased litter on our streets, on the other you have government policies that isolate the elderly, and healthcare that is driven by the bottom line. Join all the dots together and you have a selfish society. Sweet William, Im on your side.
John Halford with Dr Keith Baker at CERN.
table and having it remain balanced for 13.7 billion years. It could not have been a chaotic process. Something made this universe to be as delicately balanced as it is and allow us to exist. This is pretty amazing, even at our level of understanding, and our understanding will increase over time, obviously. PT: There have been some reports recently that you are on the verge of a breakthrough. What does this mean? Keith Baker: Some people say this is the most exciting period in the history of our field or in many generations. All our experiments up until now indicate that there has to be some new phenomenon that happens when we collide protons together as were doing now. But we dont know if that new phenomenon is going to be this Higgs mechanism, or extra dimensions, or super symmetric particles that pop out of the vacuum. And thats what makes it exciting. The recent news from CERN should be clarified. What is seen is tantalizing evidence that there might be a Standard Model Higgs boson in the vicinity of 125 GeV or so, but it is certainly not a discovery. We particle physicists refer to searches for new phenomena (such as the Higgs) in terms of the probability that what we observe is truly physics phenomena (fivesigma or greater) versus whether it could be a statistical fluctuation or some instrumental anomaly (less than fivesigma). Our experience guides us to make a five-sigma observation the threshold for calling what we see a real discovery. We have seen three-sigma effects come and go in our analysis. So while my advice to you at this point is dont bet the farm on these latest results signalling a new discovery, they are in my opinion tantalizing evidence of something new a breakthrough. That is the reason for the media hype about a Higgs discovery. With more data and more analysis, we can make a strong statement one way or another. In any case, 2012 will be an exciting year if the LHC runs as well as it has in 2011! What we understand now just may be a small piece of something thats much bigger. And for me, being a part of this adventure is why I went into physics in the first place!
describe this Standard Model of Particle Physics as the greatest theory ever developed. But there are problems with this Standard Model. It doesnt explain the dark matter and dark energy, which are the most dominant constituents of our universe. In the Standard Model all the particles are mass-less. Thats the only way the theorists who developed this Standard Model could make it work. But we know that particles do have mass. For example, a proton is heavier than an electron. A lambda hyperon is heavier than a proton. So we know that these things have mass, so what is it that gives them mass? There could be any number of explanations, but the most likely one is whats called Higgs field. It was named after Peter Higgs, a Scotsman. He theorized that theres a field that interacts with particles that gives them mass. And so if there is a Higgs field, then there should be a particle the Higgs boson. They called it the god particle because its the only missing piece of this Standard Model. We have to discover it to explain how it is that particles have mass. It is a scientific question not a religious one. There are other ideas. For example, some have suggested there are extra dimensions. Our experience tells us that we live in a world that has three space dimensions plus time. But there could be other dimensions that exist. If they do, theyre probably small, and we just pass through them. PT: Do you have a problem reconciling this extraordinary experimental field that you work in with your belief in God? Keith Baker: That has never been an issue. I see no incompatibility with being a scientist and being a Christian. I will say that there are times when Ill look at the universe and just say wow! It is so delicately balanced. Some people have compared it to balancing a pencil on its tip on the
by Peter Sheppard
Plain Truth Reader Survey: The results

In the last issue of The Plain Truth, we carried a Reader Survey on the back page and asked if youd be kind enough to complete and return it to us. Well, were delighted to report that we had a brilliant response the results of which will help us in several ways. First, we know a little more about you, our readers. We know more about what you like in the magazine and the things that you dont like quite so much.
Section B: What you told us about The Plain Truth

1. Which type of articles do you particularly like? (Choose as many or as few.) Factual/Historical: 84% Testimonies/stories: 81% Theological: 75% Inspirational: 72% Regular columns: 62% Interviews: 60% 2. Which non article items do you particularly like? (Choose as many or as few.) Letters page: 61% Hmm: 60% Editorial: 53% First Break: 39% Book reviews: 36% 3. Do you ever visit our website (www.plain-truth.org.uk)? Cant no access: No: Yes: 4. How much of The Plain Truth do you read? All of it: Most: Some: Selected items only: 5. When youve finished the magazine you: Pass it on: Keep a while: Keep indefinitely: Recycle:
An anniversary message
cross the UK, 2012 looks set to be a year when a variety of anniversaries and significant events will be either celebrated or remembered. From the bicentenary of the birth of Victorian novelist Charles Dickens to the centenary of Scotts victory in reaching the South Pole in 1912.
We also have a better idea of how many people read the magazine as very many of you pass on your copy after youve read it.
Section A: Heres what you told us about yourselves:

1. How long have you been a reader? Over 10 years: 5-10 years: 2-4 years: Less than 4 years: 2. Who reads The Plain Truth? Over 75 years old: Between 65-74 years old: Aged 55-64 years old: Those 45-54 years old: All under 45 years old: 3. How you described your lifestyle. In full-time education: Full/part-time employment: Unemployed: Homemaker: Retired: Other/not stated: Less than 61% 31% 6% 2% 35% 35% 20% 9% 1% Less than 1% 16% 2% 4% 73% 5%
Trusting God to provide
But probably the most joyful and significant of anniversaries to be celebrated in the UK is the Queens Diamond Jubilee in June. And theres another anniversary happening this year, right here, under your nose. However, youre probably not aware of this celebration although its through your efforts that this milestone event has been made possible. Let me tell you more. It was just ten years ago this year when the decision was made to set up The Plain Truth as an independent charity to continue production of this free Christian magazine. (Sadly, its previous publishers no longer had the resources or finances to keep it as an ongoing publication.) I was appointed as the first Chairman of this new charity and a board of capable and experienced individuals took up the role of trustees to ensure the magazines immediate future was secure. After a generous donation from its former publisher to set us going, we were then reliant solely upon Gods grace and the generosity of you, our readers, to help us on our journey.
From these humble beginnings we set out on a venture of printing The Plain Truth magazine on a regular basis. We sometimes wondered how many issues we would be able to produce with the resources we had but we went forward trusting that God would provide our needs. And he has. Over this last decade we have experimented with producing the magazine more than four times a year but at the moment our financial resources have restricted us to a quarterly publication. But all our discussions have been done against a background that the trustees did not wish to compromise the quality of the magazine or to put a price on it. And gladly these goals have been achieved during the last ten years and we plan to continue along this route in the future too. So as we celebrate our tenth anniversary, I am very grateful to all those involved in producing such a quality Christian magazine. A publication that aims as one of its readers put so eloquently to bring non-believers to faith and to increase the relationship of believers to God. It is sobering to note that over the years and particularly in the recent economic downturn that many Christian publications have had to cease production. And especially at a time when the Christian message is perhaps declining in our growing secular society too. But the publishing of The Plain Truth over this last decade has really only been made possible by the prayers and donations of many of our readers. And for this continued and loyal support I would like to give my heartfelt thanks to you all for enabling the magazine to continue to keep our Christian ministry available to all. So, thank you very much for enabling the last ten years of publishing and we hope you will stay with us as we step out in faith to embark on the next leg of our journey.
46% 43% 11% 58% 33% 7% 2% 51% 19% 16% 14%
4. How you described your church attendance. Regularly attend: 58% Occasionally attend: 18% Rarely/never attend: 24% 5. Your view of Christianitys image in the UK. Positive: Negative: Irrelevant: Neutral: Other/no answer: 14% 20% 34% 20% 12%
6. To the question: How many people read your copy of The Plain Truth, we concluded that an average copy of the magazine is read by 2.32 people. (And thats before 51% of copies are passed on!) But here are the other stats for that question: One person: 42% 2-3 people: 47% 4-5 people: 6% 6-10 people: 2% More than 10 people: 3% 7. If the magazine was reduced to a smaller size (like Readers Digest) how would you feel? It would make no difference: 62% Be disappointed: 25% Prefer it: 13% We are very appreciative for your feedback which will be most helpful in our future planning. Thank you.
FREE BOOK DRAW WINNER

The winner of the Free Book Draw for completion of the Reader Survey was: Mrs Astrid Saul from Lurgan in County Armagh, Northern Ireland. Congratulations, Mrs Saul.
Peter Sheppard1
Chairman
1 Currently living in Edinburgh, Peter Sheppard is a retired Senior VAT Consultant working for RBS.
On the fridge door

Are you an unpublished writer waiting for your first break? Submit a 600-word article, typed, double-spaced and ideally as a Word attachment, to editor@plaintruth.co.uk. Writing tutor Fiona Veitch Smith will choose the most promising ones for publication in The Plain Truth. For free writing advice see her website www.thecraftywriter.com Sent in by Ingrid Baur, Sweden, who has had this displayed for over 20 years: Have you earned one more tomorrow? Is anybody happy because you passed this way? Does anyone remember that you spoke to him today? The day is almost over, and its toiling time is thru. Is there anyone to utter a kindly word for you? Can you say tonight in parting with the day thats slipping fast That you helped a single brother of the many that you passed? Is a single heart rejoicing over what you did or said. Does a man whose hopes were fading now with courage look ahead? Did you waste your day or use it; Was it well or poorly spent? Did you leave a trail of kindness or a scar of discontent? As you close your eyes in slumber, do you think that God will say You have earned one more tomorrow by the work you did today? Ross G Witter
Fionas Critique Wendys article is structured like a travel narrative. It utilises the senses to help the reader experience the location and, at times, build tension. Wendy also uses in medias res (in the middle of things) to start the article; again a technique frequently used in travel writing. And like all good travel writers she uses the external journey as a metaphor for an inner journey. The only negative was that occasionally Wendy was so close to the action that things that made sense to her wouldnt necessarily make sense to a first-time reader. So I asked her to reword some of the paragraphs and clarify some descriptions and motivations.
Fionas Top Tips Travel writing is a good vehicle for Christian writers as it usually deals with an inner and outer journey. Use all the senses in your descriptions to help the reader experience the location. But still try to keep a good balance of description and narrative or it will become one long poem. Dont be scared to mix up your timeline but make sure your reader can still find their bearings. Nuggets of wisdom
Things turn out best for the people that make the best of how things turn out. Anon You can tell more about a person by what he says about others than you can by what others say about him. Anon Employ your time in improving yourself by other mens writings, so that you shall gain easily what others have laboured hard for. Socrates When eating fruit, remember the one who planted the tree. Vietnamese proverb Well done is better than well said. Benjamin Franklin
Kindness is the golden chain by which society is bound together.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, attributed, Treasury of Thought
On kindness
A four-wheeled angel
I woke up in a bad mood. I should have been happy. After four weeks on outreach in Mozambique five of us were now making our way back to our Youth With a Mission (YWAM) base in South Africa, a 2,500km journey by road. It was my second visit to Mozambique and I had no idea why God had sent me here again. The first visit had been a time of internal struggles as God showed me where I needed to change, but I had also learnt a tremendous amount in a short time about Africa and its people. Then I had found myself helping out at a private clinic attached to an orphanage, treating mainly children (unfortunately, there was never enough medicine to go round for their parents). I had witnessed children suffering from numerous avoidable conditions, and being brought to the clinic as a last resort when the witch doctor had not found a cure. This visit was part of an outreach for a Primary Healthcare Course which I had done in South Africa. It had been a busy time attending a local hospital and a nearby clinic to teach, observe and complete a number of practical procedures. I had preached on a couple of occasions at local churches; and visited a prison where a number of prisoners had given their lives to Jesus. So why the bad mood? Although I had done the journey several times before, this was the first time I had done it on a Sunday afternoon when I knew there would be very little traffic on the road. With no public transport to get us across a mile of no-mans land between the two borders, plus a further five miles to Mutare, where we would catch a train to
by Wendy Underhill
Constant kindness can accomplish much . As the sun makes ice melt, kindness causes misunderstanding, mistrust, and hostility to evaporate .
Albert Schweitzer
Harare and on to South Africa by coach, it was not going to be an easy journey. I had begun to realize that I was unable to trust God completely because I needed to be in control and organize every detail of the journey. But once again God showed His faithfulness. The regular mini-bus service between Beira and Chamoio, the nearest border town, stopped outside the YWAM base, and it turned out to be a new coach, with plenty of room for the five of us. Then when we arrived at Chamoio a local bus called a chappa was waiting to leave for the border. When we reached the border we stepped into silence. No wind to rustle the dry grass, no birds were singing and the only noise was the occasional buzz of an insect. And it was very hot. We were left looking at the only two cars parked in the lay-by: one man wanting to change currency (which was very common) and the other a large old car. I went up to the driver and asked if his car was a taxi. And it was! Not only was he willing to take us right through to Mutare, (it was unusual for a taxi driver to have a passport) but the car could fit all of us and our luggage. Being the only car going through the border our driver quickly helped us with all the formalities and in a very short time we were speeding on our way to the Holiday Inn in Mutare to enjoy the delights of turning on a tap to wash our faces and to have a good English meal! To this day I believe our driver to be an angel. Only God could have sent that taxi for our use. I hadnt had to organize a single part of that journey and I had learnt a valuable lesson: God really is in control.
Kindness is the language which the deaf can hear and the blind can see .
Mark Twain
Kindness is loving people more than they deserve .

Joseph Joubert
Our deeds determine us as much as we determine our deeds.

George Eliot
Tigers have striped skin, not just striped fur. Emus and kangaroos cannot walk backwards, and are on the Australian coat of arms for that reason.
Forgiveness Forgiveness is power. It frees us from every constraint of the past, and helps us overcome every obstacle. It can heal both the forgiver and the forgiven. In fact, it would change the world if we allowed it to. Each of us holds the keys to forgiveness in our hands. It remains to us whether or not we choose to use them.
Why Forgive, by Johann Christoph Arnold
The sixth sick sheiks sixth sheeps sick is said to be the toughest tongue twister in the English language.
A snail can sleep for three years. A crocodile always grows new teeth to replace the old teeth!
A ducks quack doesnt echo, and no one knows why.

Plain Truth UK

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Spring 2012

Random Acts of Kindness p6

Sometimes, less is more

19 A view from the High Street 22 First Break

The Plain Truth Spring 2012

Spring 2012 TheP lain Truth

The Plain Truth Letters

Reader Survey comments

Send your letters to:

Diamond Jubilee message

The Plain Truth Spring 2012

Spring 2012 TheP lain Truth

Recipient of TKO initiative. Photo: TKO archive.

Limited by our own expectations?

Four founding members of TKO. Photo: TKO archive.

The experiment begins

The Plain Truth Spring 2012

Spring 2012 TheP lain Truth

Continued from page 7

Photo courtesy Bruce Adams/Daily Mail/Solo Syndication.

Caths cakes cause a stir and bring a little happiness too!

TKO inspiring young minds

The Kindness Offensive Constitution

Cath Webb in her kitchen baking yet another cake.

The Plain Truth Spring 2012

Spring 2012 TheP lain Truth

No God please were British

10 The Plain Truth Spring 2012

Spring 2012 TheP lain Truth 11

Looking upon Jesus with love

Longing after Jesus for his own sake

12 The Plain Truth Spring 2012

Spring 2012 TheP lain Truth 13

Supporting lives in their darkest of times

Enjoying a Torch Trust holiday.

Bibles and magazines

Malawi Fellowship Group for sight loss.

Acceptance and friendship

14 The Plain Truth Spring 2012

Spring 2012 TheP lain Truth 15

A threat to our beliefs?

Turning understanding on its head

Approaching the light

CERN Super Collider, Geneva, Switzerland.

Spring 2012 TheP lain Truth 17

So why collide hadrons? (And what are they, anyway?)

THE PLAIN TRUTH

John Halford with Dr Keith Baker at CERN.

18 The Plain Truth Spring 2012

Spring 2012 TheP lain Truth 19

Plain Truth Reader Survey: The results

Section B: What you told us about The Plain Truth

Section A: Heres what you told us about yourselves:

Trusting God to provide

46% 43% 11% 58% 33% 7% 2% 51% 19% 16% 14%

FREE BOOK DRAW WINNER

20 The Plain Truth Spring 2012

Spring 2012 TheP lain Truth 21

On the fridge door

Kindness is the golden chain by which society is bound together.

Kindness is loving people more than they deserve .

Our deeds determine us as much as we determine our deeds.

A ducks quack doesnt echo, and no one knows why.

22 The Plain Truth Spring 2012