I'm preaching about trust on Sunday morning and we're thinking about trust at St Arbuck's on Sunday afternoon - if you're passing the Market Square Starbucks on Sunday around 4pm, drop in, grab a coffee and a muffin and come up and join us.
So, I've been reading Anthony Seldon's new book, Trust: How we lost it and how to get it back, and so far, so good. I've only read the first two chapters but his analysis of why we are facing a problem with trust in our society seems to me to cover most of the bases.
In particular, he talks about the demise of organised religion as one of ten contributing factors - others being the speed of life, inequality, corporate greed, failing politicians, the media - and he does so in a way that recognises what he's saying will not be universally popular.
His argument is that the three monotheistic religions have at their core a call to service, as well as greed social and moral norms. And he quotes Demos' Geoff Mulgan who says that without the clear moral codes provided by organised religion 'it is much harder to understand your place in society; it is much harder to picture what is going on'. And for this reason trust is harder because it relies on agreed norms of behaviour.
It's an interesting thought. I wonder what others think?
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