The importance of cultural ethos was highlighted earlier this year by partygate. But cultural ethos varies in less prominent situations: different committees of the same local authority, similar wards in the same hospital, schools in the same community, branches of the same firm, similar high-rise blocks in the same street… the list could go on.

One of the privileges in my years as a parish minister and a street pastor has been to hear many confidences from people who are concerned about issues like bullying, victimisation, dishonesty, incompetence and waste of public money. It is extremely important to have someone like a chaplain to whom folk can go without feeling that they are being disloyal, for someone listening can pre-empt people bottling things up. Some may appear trivial or amusing, though frustrating for the person at the receiving end, such as the men who were sent to replace a fence in a local authority house. They did. When the tenant returned from work that night, she came to the manse for help because they had put a fence round her house but had not put a gate in the fence. The excuse next day was that: 'the line was for a fence not a fence with a gate'.

Like navigating Scylla and Charybdis, it is difficult to know how to handle these. Confidentiality is vitally important, unless as in the case of child abuse the course of action is clear. On one hand, there is the danger of being pressurised into being a 'whistle-blower mouthpiece', like one of the biblical minor prophets. Sometimes – unlike them – one can get things wrong, and people would then dismiss anything one says. On the other hand, if one does not show the relevance of the Christian faith to daily life, there is the danger that then the Christian faith would be dismissed as irrelevant.

Rather than wait for negatives to arise, is it not better to pre-empt problems by developing a positive culture of trust in which people matter? Some decades ago, while by no means was everyone a believer in God and there were many problems, there was a general acceptance of trust, with accountability ultimately to God. One's finances were looked after by bankers as a trust, similarly education by teachers, etc. There were administrative guidelines. But remove the concept of God, and the next layer of authority is guidelines, expanded into regulations by the high priests of regulations: the bureaucrats.

Gone is the note of trust in which people are respected as individuals, replaced by a tick-box culture. In this culture, not only are people often not respected as individuals, but the ultimate values in life are not people, but profit in industry and image in a celebrity culture.

The Christian faith affirms the value of people more than profit or image. Secularists wish to keep faith out of the public arena. Everyone has a worldview which they accept by faith and by which operationally they live. Secular humanism – like Christianity, Islam, etc – is accepted by faith, but secularists seek to impose their worldview on others by preventing any alternative worldview seeing the light of day! However, when the positive good news of the Christian faith does reach the public arena, things can happen.

Sajid Javid resigned as Health Minister in Westminster after listening to a sermon by Rev Les Isaac (founder of Street Pastors) at a parliamentary prayer meeting in which he spoke about the responsibility that comes with leadership to serve the interests of others above your own.

Javid's resignation triggered the downfall of Boris Johnson and the acceptance of a need to change the culture of government. There is a difference between management and leadership. Management is organising, leadership involves vision and changing culture to a worldview which sees beyond 'me'.

Sandy Gunn



For now, the wee swamp is, more or less, still swamplike, with only an occasional sadness where once there was green. Beyond the parapet, the nearby millpond is no longer visible, invaded on an epic scale by himalayan balsam. Rosebay willowherb is mustering for a serious challenge to the non-native species, but although almost 10 feet tall in places is destined to lose the battle. Neglect and our new summer season march in step, conspiring to despoil a once pleasant public amenity. 'Once', you'll notice, has already been used twice, sending out a signal that what we are witnessing is of concern. Actually, it should perhaps be of a great deal more than concern, but hey ho! it's the holidays: time to head for a very long queue pointing south.

Are we there yet?
I need a wee wee.
Is there any juice left? I'm thirsty.

Elsewhere, at the destination of dreams and memories, of Cézanne, Bardot, la Mer... Is there still a spot where lavender might flourish on a southern slope, gently unfolding, down through ancient olive groves, orchards of lemon, peach and apricot, banks of thyme and rosemary?

Not once!? Surely not?

Shelagh Gardiner



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