First then the concept of God. God for me, is not the old man in the sky, but Paul Tillich’s definition as the “ground of our being.” My interest in the definition of God, really began when I read John Robinson’s book “Honest to God” (SCM Press Ltd, London 1963) which I must have bought around that time. I have read it regularly ever since. It introduced me to a number of important authors, including Paul Tillich, and his work on “The ground of our being”. Subsequently, the work of Martin Buber in “I and Thou” (2^nd Edition, T and T Clark, Edinburgh, reprinted 1984) became important to me. A few other works have also been inspirational, Henry Drummond’s Essays “The Greatest Thing in the World” (Hodder, first published in 1890, 2009 Edition) “A History of God” by Karen Armstrong (Vintage Press, 1999), “God: a human history”, Reza Aslan, (Transworld Publishers, 2017) and, “The Sixth Paradigm” by Richard Holloway. These books and writings have taken me into new paths and made me think differently.

Robinson begins by challenging the God “up there” and “out there” and the assumptions which don’t fit in the 20^th century when the book was written. He refers to several pieces of writing which helped his thinking. The first is by Paul Tillich and “The Shaking of the Foundations” (Pelican Edition, 1962) in which one of the sermons is called “The depth of Existence”.  I quote (p57); 

“The name of this infinite and inexhaustible depth and ground of all being is God. That depth is what the word God means. And if that word has not much meaning for you, translate it, and speak of the depths of your lives, the source of your being, of your ultimate concern, of what you take seriously without reservation. Perhaps, in order to do so, you must forget everything traditional you have learned about God, perhaps even the word itself. 

Robinson makes the point that this is just not the old system in reverse, with a God “down under” for a God “up there”. When Tillich uses the term, he is not speaking of another being at all. He is speaking of the ground of all being. Tillich says, “Perhaps you should call this depth hope, simply hope”. Robinson goes on,

“It is saying that God, the final truth and reality “deep down things, is love.” And adds “and the specifically Christian view of the world is asserting that the final definition of this reality, from which “nothing can separate us”, since it is the very ground of our being, is “the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” 

My own thinking on this debate relates to the points noted above. We all have the ability to Love, and in Tillich’s words, God is the “Ground of our Being.” God is in us and is expressed in the love we have for others. God is the Love within you and me. The soul is where our love resides.

This completely changes the definition of God from “the supreme being, a power, a force and the object of worship,” to” the depth of our own being, associated with love, our love”. But a word of caution, as Tillich says (p6)

“But man is not God, and whenever he has claimed to be like God, he has been rebuked and brought to self-destruction and despair.”

He also makes an important point about joy.

“The last thing I want to say about the way to the depth concerns one of these paradoxes. The end of the way is Joy. Joy is deeper than suffering. It is ultimate. ….. Eternal joy is the end of the ways of God. The message of all religions is that the Kingdom of God is peace and joy. And it is the message of Christianity…. For in depth is truth; and in the depth, is hope; and in the depth, is joy.”

This concept of God is central to how we need, and use, churches.

Much of my recent interest has been on happiness and quality of life, partly from a clinical perspective, and from this I derived my interest in the role of love as a source of happiness.

If we assume that Love is the source of happiness-joy, this implies that each of us can provide, with that love, care, compassion, concern, happiness, for individuals and families, communities and causes. Through love, we have the ability and power to change things for the better and increase happiness

Everyone has the capacity to love, it is a universal attribute. Everyone can express feelings, feel concerned, want to help others, and help to achieve the greatest happiness for the greatest number. This is the great power of love, which is regardless of race, religion, gender or colour

This can be done acting alone or acting together. But it does require action, energy, passion and in some cases personal hardship and sacrifice. Tackling poverty, neglect, prejudice, racial tensions, etc is not easy. Sometimes it requires special skills, but everyone can, and must, be involved if the world is to be a better place. This inherent love, inside us all, is the motivation to help others.

This love can be delivered in many different ways, and at many different levels. For example, being good parents, neighbours, friends, companions, workmates, volunteering or through education and learning, health and social care, culture, creativity or by developing new knowledge, etc. In some instances, these initiatives will require new funding from philanthropic or recognised bodies.

It also requires people of vision who can set the agenda, set out the values, and show how it can be done. In the past, present, and surely in the future, such people have, and will continue, to provide the leadership, the ideas and the language to change things. In the past these were the prophets, the teachers and gurus, who were able to provide ways of understanding love and its power and how to achieve change. Jesus, Mohamed, Buddha, would be key examples of this, transforming the ways in which we think about things and showing how powerful love could be.

Shared love has a particular power. If you put all this love together then it becomes a remarkable resource for change and the promotion of goodwill; a source, through love, of energy, passion and power. This love defines God and is an enormous power for good, available for anyone and everyone, if we want it. God is love, and we can tap into this power through prayer, creating a kind of spiritual internet, connecting people and ideas.

How do we learn about love? In some senses, this depends on who you are and where you are from. By accident of birth you may have been brought up in a particular faith background, or perhaps none.  There are two assumptions to be made. First, that all of us have an innate ability to love. Second, that it is possible to learn to love more. As Adam Smith said,

“Howsoever selfish man may be supposed there are evidently some principles in his nature which interest him in the fortunes of others, though he derives nothing from it but the pleasure of seeing it.”

We learn about love in many different ways; from family and friends, from our peers, from workmates, from heroes and heroines in literature and the cinema and screen, and our values are often learned from our faith background.

My thoughts on happiness thus considered the following. Happiness could be seen to be the outcome of love which, in itself, is a deep inner passion to care for others. It is a process motivated both by faith for those who have one, and also in those with no faith. Happiness is the outcome of actions to help and care for others and comes from the heart. It can both be given, and received. Both give happiness to each of the parties, and these can be individuals or communities. As Henry Drummond says (p13) “There is no happiness in having or getting, but only in giving.” Happiness is thus a by-product of doing something. It depends on action. Yours or someone else’s. Your happiness is a consequence, a secondary issue and not the primary aim.

My colleague the Reverend Stuart MacQuarrie, Chaplain at the University of Glasgow, pointed out to me that while everyone has the capacity to love, not everyone has the capacity to accept being loved, or to be loved. Much effort has been spent trying to help people who could not accept that they could be loved. In such people their behaviour and conduct might be seen as attempts to prove that they could not be loved. Others have written about this, as in Karen Armstrong’s book “Twelve Steps to a Compassionate Life” (The Bodley Head, 2011) to guide people to be loved. 

Richard Holloway’s lectures on the Sixth Paradigm are relevant. (Richard Holloway is a former Anglican Primus of Scotland) (http://homepages.which.net/radical.faith/holloway/sixth%20paradigm.htm) These were written from notes taken of largely extempore addresses given at Cheltenham, UK in May 2003. In these talks Holloway lays out the way in which the practice of Christianity has changed over the centuries. These Paradigms show how things have changed, but also how little they have. He contrasts this with science which, when there is a major change in our knowledge, it means that we forget the last paradigm and work with the new. Whether it be evolution, genetic screening, understanding of astronomy, and others. (see The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, Thomas Kuhn, University of Chicago Press, 2012)

The first paradigm relates to the first century of Christianity, when it was supposed that there would soon be the end of the world, and that Jesus would return. The second paradigm goes from the first to the sixth centuries and is associated with Greek culture. Paradigm three is the medieval Roman Catholic church between the 11^th and the 15^th centuries.  This helped to organise the church, of which much still remains. The fourth paradigm is that of the 16^th Century Protestant Reformation. The fifth paradigm is that of the 17^th-19^th centuries. It was an attempt to change things, and sometimes called “liberal Christianity”. Holloway makes the point that this is a way easily attacked, from within, and without, the Church.

The sixth paradigm is in the process of emerging, and it takes us into new ground. It seems we are trying to understand how things should be now, and how Christianity fits into the world.  It is regularly challenged by those outside the Church particularly in relation to the concept of God, the way in which the churches display their methods of worship, and their role in the world today. Part of the function of this talk has been to help me to determine, and set out, my own Sixth Paradigm.

What then is my sixth Paradigm? I can’t believe in God as a man in the sky, that God, is up there or out there. But I do believe that there is a power, a spirit which binds us all, love. It is the depth of our being; it is the love within you and me. My faith rests on the power of Jesus, who, in his short ministry set out values which have lasted 2000 years, values of love and support for others. There remains a need to bring the various churches and faiths together to demonstrate the power that is available if we really work in partnership.

The dialogue concerns the prisoner’s well-being and when asked “Surely the well-being of your parishioner’s is your concern?” The minister replies “My concern is with my parishioner’s spiritual well-being. It is not for me to meddle in the management of the estate.” A response which might merit some discussion.

Much of the effort generated in this way, has gone into helping those in poverty or deprivation and there have been some recent, remarkable stories to tell, from each of which I have learned a lot. For example, the work of George McLeod in setting up the Iona Community to give a purpose to the lives of many people, beginning in Govan in Glasgow (George MacLeod, Ronald Fergusson, Collins 1990). Geoffrey Shaw began his work in the Gorbals in Glasgow, another deprived area (Geoff, Ron Ferguson, Famedram, Publishers, Gartocharn, 1979). Richard Holloway himself, worked in the Gorbals and elsewhere, together with his exciting work with the Big Noise and Sistema Scotland, are great examples of what can be done and his autobiography, “Leaving Alexandria” (Canongate Books Ltd 2012) is certainly worth a read.  In it he makes the following comment.

“It was obvious that, with or without belief in God, what Jesus demanded, was needed as much in our time as in his. This was still a cruel unequal world, as cruel as when Jesus had startled its leaders by telling them that God was not on their side, but on the side of those they trampled on….you no longer needed to play conceptual games with God. What you had to do was to clothe the naked, feed the hungry and give cold water to the thirsty. God was no longer on his supernatural throne. The place to find him was amongst the dispossessed, among the wretched of the earth.” (Page 120)

More recently, the work by Norman Drummond with Columba 1400 has given help to young people from tough realities and allowed them to develop confidence and faith in themselves and through that to be of service to others. Other Youth Organisations, such as the Boys’ Brigade, can have the same impact. The Men’s Shed community project which provides opportunities for men to meet others and do things together is another good example of this, and churches with premises could be part of this type of project. Changing lives through love, from the depth of our beings. There are many more such examples across the world which provide inspiration for others.

I first met Andrew Mawson (now Lord Mawson) in the early 1990’s when I was Chief Medical Officer in England. He had been appointed Minister of the church in Bromley-by-Bow in the east end of London in 1987, and it was anticipated that it would shortly close because of dwindling membership. However, he and his wife Susan, completely changed this. They started a healthy living centre, dance, and art studio and workshop a nursery and lots of other activities, whilst retaining the worship. A remarkable achievement.

This kind of work has been expanded and entitles “Social Prescriptions” where people can be encouraged  to take up new activities and meet new friends and people. In my own work with cancer patients, “Tak Tent” (Take Care) was one way of bringing patients families and friends closer to share experiences, do things together, and support each other

Another example would be the Salvation Army. Founded in 1865 by William Booth from a Methodist background, the Army work in the community with children and families, tackling many social problems. They retain the Christian faith. 

To return to the beginning and this chapel as an example. It has daily short services based on Govan Old Parish Church, during term. It provides a space to give thanks for things happening in the university-anatomy donors, support for survivors of gender-based violence, thanksgiving for pets, thanksgiving before each graduation ceremony, funeral and memorial services, annual visits of the Catholic Archbishop of Glasgow and the Moderator of the Church of Scotland. Over 120-130 marriage services each year.

As an exhibition space, hosting films, musical concerts Self-defence classes for women, ball room dancing.

Christmas service attracts 1500 people and includes nine lessons and carols

St Martin’s Umzug for the German people around Glasgow

Each week 80-100 people gather for creative conversation with well-known authors.

These examples noted above are just the tip of the iceberg and relate to ones which have interested me. There are thousands of others, in both religious and community organisations. Bringing them together would show examples of what can be done and how the church, while retaining its worship and faith, can learn from others and contribute to improving the lives of millions of people.

There is, of course, a negative side to all of this. Over the centuries the religious dimension has resulted in hatred, violence and destruction, wars and crusades, the very opposite of love. We should remember this in our thinking about faith and love.

There is an assumption in this discussion, that it is the poor and needy who need attention and that is top of the agenda. However, I have met the occasional doctor who might have benefitted from love. Likewise, the lawyer, the teacher, the banker, and many others. Those with power and money may not be as happy as they seem, and they also need care and love.

So what is the way forward, and what is the role of the church? These might be

         Sacred places for worship and for inspiration

They reflect History and culture

         They act as Community resource, a hub welcoming and open

Community involvement-bringing the community in

Working with others-organisation and faiths

 Churches Do have a role and these are what churches are for.

My conclusion is that we do need churches!

My stall in the Chapel has above it my coat of arms. Sir Kerr’s is at the far end of the stalls. It is difficult to create one, and, in particular, the motto.  My motto is Cum Scientia Succurro, “Through knowledge I help others”.

What lessons have I learned in my life?. What is all this learning for? What is the purpose of a School of Medicine or a Faculty of Divinity?

Mark Twain said that there are two important days in your life. The day you are born and the day you discover why.

I had not seriously considered my purpose until recently I began writing my memoirs, and perhaps that is the way it should be. But now that I am old I can look back at what I have done, and, more importantly, what I have not done, or failed to do. In the same way we can all look back at the churches we were part of, and look at what they have contributed, to members and the wider community.

Looking forward, what more can churches do, through love, to make the world a better place. Churches are about you and me, those who stand with us, and the wider community. It is about sharing the love with others.

 If God is the ground of our being, the source of love, joy and happiness, this is the Way. Jesus is the person who gave us the Truth to understand how best to live. The Holy Spirit, in our souls, is the Life which we pass to each other using the power of love within each of us.

Viva, Veritas, Vita. “May the force be with you”