That's just what we need.

I'm always interested to see what happens when a business closes in Chelmsford High Street. I see it as an indication of what is going on in the economy and something of a reflection of society and our values. Woolworths  was a favourite store of my childhood in Chelmsford and I was sad to see it go. There was a certain irony in Barclays Bank moving into the premises given their contribution to the meltdown of our economy and the demise of many businesses in the subsequent recession.

Another closure in Chelmsford High Street was Jessops the camera shop. The building has been vacant for some time and today I discovered who has moved in, William Hill the bookmakers. That's really what we needed in our city's High Street, another bookies. It's not enough that I can't watch a football match on television without various loud mouthed characters shouting the odds at me for five minutes at a time, shop by shop they are taking over our town and city centres. One of the factors in Jessops' demise was the on-line market which meant they just couldn't compete. There is a preponderance of gambling sites on-line but it doesn't seem to have had too much of an impact on betting shops given the number we now have in Chelmsford. Perhaps it really is a statement about what is going on in our economy and what values we espouse as a society.

Fan Dancing and the Archbishop

It would have been more edifying for the new Archbishop of Canterbury’s name to have been revealed by Dita Von Teese fan dancing on the steps of St Paul, than for the complete omnishambles that the Church of England has managed to concoct. For months we have been encouraged to pray for those charged with discerning God’s will on this matter only for the news to have seeped out through leaks to favoured journalists and betting at the bookies. I don’t know who has done this but the whole set up seems to have been devised to make it likely this was the way the news would come out.

Anyway, enough of the rant, here are a few of my thoughts on the new Archbishop.

1. I didn’t want the last one to go but I wish Rowan and Jane well in the next stage of their journey with God and give thanks for all they have so sacrificially given in serving him and us.
2. We should give thanks for those who have borne the burden of discerning who should be appointed Archbishop of Canterbury.
3. I hope the new Archbishop will make a priority of finding a new way of appointing his successor so we don’t have to endure this nonsense again.
4. It doesn’t matter how hard the Church tries to mess up God’s will for our lives, he has a habit of fulfilling his purposes even through our screw ups. That is as true for the people he raises up to positions of leadership as it is for the rest of us.
5. I really don’t care what accent he has, what school he went to or how much money he has. All I want to know is that the Archbishop is someone with a heart to serve God in the place where he has been called to minister. God looks on the heart not the outward appearance.
6. The new Archbishop needs, and has a right to expect, our prayers and support. Too often we have prayed for our church leaders on Sunday and proceeded to slag them off mercilessly the rest of the week. That doesn’t mean he shouldn’t be held accountable but the attacks on predecessors have usually been about our own preferences and prejudices that we have convinced ourselves must be God’s will.
7. Throughout this post I’ve referred to ‘he’ for ‘he’ it will be. I look forward to the day when that is no longer the case.

Now where did I put that betting slip?

Having a punt

Last year a colleague of mine cancelled his Sky Sports subscription. This was no easy move for a committed football supporter and it didn’t go down well with his football loving son. He took the decision because he was fed up with the constant stream of betting adverts shown by Sky at every possible opportunity and this was his way of registering a protest.

Unfortunately the curse of the betting adverts has now spread to ITV and no World Cup match is complete without adverts for William Hill, Ladbrokes and the other gambling companies. During the breaks we are invited to take a bet on the next scorer, the number of corners and just about every other statistic from the game being screened. To entice us we have top diamond geezer Ray Winstone intoning the odds with his exaggerated cockney blather; like he really needs the money.

So when did this start? I can’t remember seeing so many betting adverts before. Have the advertising regulations changed or has ITV changed its policy? Has some conscious decision been taken to target the World Cup as a way of launching this change?

I’m not against a person having the occasional punt on the Grand National for a bit of fun; I’ve done it myself, but this sustained exposure to gambling adverts on a major broadcasting channel is quite insidious. I really don’t want my children confronted with these adverts in the middle of the afternoon while watching a football match.

And then I remember that gambling has been institutionalised in our society and this is just the logical next step. The National Lottery is treated as a revered institution, with a prime time BBC programme watched by millions who have been told ‘you’ve got to be in it to win it.’ The funds from the Lottery are used to finance the upkeep of our heritage, arts and to underwrite a large chunk of our sport. The staging of the London Olympics will be in significant measure funded by the Lottery. The church is not exempt as it is dependant on English Heritage grants to help maintain historic church buildings via the Heritage Lottery Fund.

Where’s the harm? One of my most depressing repeated experiences as a parish priest in Dagenham was to visit the local post office and watch young single mums drawing their benefits and child allowance and then immediately spending a significant proportion on the scratch cards and lottery tickets. In one sense I couldn’t blame them; what other way were they offered a chance to escape from a life time on benefit? How else were they going to realise the dream of the sort of life style idealised by OK and Hello magazine? Why shouldn’t they believe the siren voices saying ‘It could be you’.

So gambling has become a cornerstone of public policy, an easy source of revenue for the government, a respected and desirable leisure time activity, an escape route for those feeling trapped and the panacea for all our problems. Gambling has been made so accessible that anyone can participate; on the high street, in the news agents, in the privacy of one’s home either on line or on the telephone.

What makes me most uncomfortable about our society’s increasing obsession with gambling is that it encourages us, and particularly the most vulnerable amongst us, to place our hope in chance and the promise of unearned riches to meet our needs and desires. The challenge to the church is how we share with people in a tangible way a different hope, in which life is not a gamble but a promise secured in the love and purposes of God for each one of us.