It is often emphasized how radical the apostle Paul was in proclaiming that, through faith in Christ, Gentiles can enter into the people of God without first becoming Jewish and taking on obedience to the Mosaic Law: “those who believe are the children of Abraham” (Gal 3:7).

Outside my office window there is a stunning tree. Burnt-red, tall and thick, deep blue sky behind it, and on either side trees still bright green.

We live in a time of repeated scandals in which prominent church leaders turn out to be hiding egregious sinful behaviour.

When my children were young, Valentine’s Day was hugely exciting. We made cookies with pink icing in heart shapes.

I joined the faculty at Wycliffe in 2019 only a few months before the start of the pandemic. I was in Toronto first, and visited a number of churches in-person, but by the time my wife joined me the city was in lockdown.

I’ll be retiring next summer.  People ask me “why now?”.  Lots of reasons, probably: let someone younger have a place at the faculty table; family responsibilities; health; fatigue; out of synch with the culture; “work is done,” “new things to do,” generational stage of life; and so on.

The struggle for justice seems never to be won, and it is easy for those who fight for it to become weary.  

Can a woman preach? Can women lead worship? Does God ordain authority for women in the church? It is a question that matters to me, as a woman and a priest in the Anglican church, now for more than 25 years. Greek points us toward an answer!

The following comments were transcribed from opening remarks by Professor Ephraim Radner delivered at Morning Prayer in the Wycliffe College Founder’s Chapel, on Thursday, Dece

“One must not argue about opinions.

This blog post is the first in a series, in which Wycliffe theology professors consider the COVID vaccination debate. In the following, Ephraim Radner, Professor of Historical Theology asks, “How did the issue of vaccination so divide the church?”

My first degree was in history. I was educated at the University of York in England by professors who were by and large resolutely unimpressed by notions of human progress.

My wife Annette and I own several charcoal and wash drawings by a wonderful artist, Churchill Davenport. We acquired them when we were married in the late 1980’s.

Where I grew up, in southern Pennsylvania, Groundhog Day was a big thing. For weeks before February 2, the papers, the broadcasters asked: would the groundhog—who had a name, Punxatawny Phil, from Punxatawny, Penn.—see his shadow?

The ventilator may well come to be one of the sorrowful symbols of the time of the Virus. We will associate it, as even now we do, with intense suffering, loss, and even death.

In the last few weeks, the coronavirus pandemic has introduced a new and deep anxiety and uncertainty into our lives. All kind of features of our daily lives that we formerly could rely upon have been radically altered and we have no idea about what the future holds.

Who should you listen to?  Who do you trust to learn something from?  These are important questions for students, obviously.

What can be said about Christian unity in a month that has seen yet another church propose to split?

A basic failing in much Christian preaching and teaching about the New Testament is not explaining to congregations the rich relationships between what the New Testament authors say and Old Testament texts.