About us
MCU is a membership organization open to anyone who shares its ethos.
We hold an annual conference, produce a quarterly academic journal and members' magazine, publish books and pamphlets, and encourage local groups.
If this sounds like you, why not join us?
Resources
We have a growing library of articles, poems, talks and worship resources, all indexed by author and selectable by source or topic.
Print this page
Email this pageIt got solved by reasonable definitions and logical inferences based on common experience. That's what one can expect metaphysics to deliver, and it is far from a trivial result. For more, you'll need faith in revelation.
IngoB
Ship of Fools
Modern to be modern?
Jonathan Clatworthy
'Modern Churchpeople's Union' is not the most attractive name for an organisation.
We began in 1898 as The Churchmen's Union for the Advancement of Liberal Religious Thought. We owe the word 'modern' to an unlikely benefactor, Pope Pius X whose 1907 encyclical condemned as 'modernists' those Roman Catholics who developed their own ideas instead of just accepting what the Vatican taught. Many Anglican catholics were happy to call themselves modernists, and by way of including them we became The Modern Churchmen's Union in the 1920s. In 1987 'Churchmen' became 'Churchpeople', producing the name we have now ...
The coup has already occurred
Paul Bagshaw from Not the same stream
One of the key objections to the Covenant was that it would lead to a concentration of power within the Communion and a centralising of decision making. That doesn't matter now. Concentration and centralisation have already happened: the coup has occurred and very few people seem to have noticed ...
The Standing Committee of the Anglican Communion has become the executive body for the Communion and is in the process of arrogating more powers to itself. If the Covenant is passed it will become the governing body of the Anglican Communion ...
Events for this month and next
Friday 5 - Sunday 7 February
Living Spirituality Network - Making peace where we live, work and pray
Saturday 6 February
CSCS - Sexuality and Human Flourishing
Friday 12 - Sunday 14 February
Christian Ecology Link - 'On the Verge of Chaos'
Friday 19 - Sunday 21 February
Friends of SCM - Living It Out: Good News for All Generations
Saturday 6 March
Living Spirituality Network - Exploring the Encounter
Friday 19 - Sunday 21 March
Living Spirituality Network - Peacemaking in a Time of Global Crisis
Tuesday 23 March
Living Spirituality Network - The Cloud of Unknowing as a Basis for Spiritual Development
Shifting Paradigms: Theology & Economics in the 21st Century
Book now for the 2010 MCU annual conference.
To be held in July at High Leigh (above) and chaired by
Edmund Newell, speakers so far include
Stephen Green,
Philip Goodchild,
Catherine Cowley,
Michael Northcott,
Valpy Fitzgerald and
Kathryn Tanner.
From our quarterly publications
In the January editions:
Modern Believing
- Liberal Theology in a Contemporary World
Paul Badham introduces conference papers by John Saxbee, Geoffrey Rowell, Keith Ward, Brian Smith, Helen-Ann Hartley, Jonathan Clatworthy and Peter Selby. - Books reviewed
by Martyn Percy, Ian Corbett, Geri Parlby, John Rees, Jenny Gaffin and Brian Mountford.
Signs of the Times
- Simon Tebbutt: In memoriam
Richard Truss, Nicholas Henderson and Peter Mills. - The Anglican Church In North America
Paul Bagshaw assesses 'a protest movement with many mothers'. - Dear Sir or Madam: A Journey from Female to Male
Mark Dalby finds Mark Rees' updated account an excellent book. - The Gospel in the Global Village
Anthony Woollard reviews a collection of addresses and sermons by Katharine Jefferts Schori. - Assisted Dying
David Taylor reports on the NW region day conference in November. - Is it modern to be modern?
Jonathan Clatworthy on why we can be proud to be modernists.
Featured books
The bookshop pages have details and purchase links for books from conference reading lists, that MCU people have written or contributed to, or that otherwise reflect liberal church interests.
