Opinion

  THIS has been a very difficult year in many respects. Jobs are scarce; the economy is not really picking up and what is worse, violence continues to rear its ugly head now and again. We don’t even know whether the coming Christmas will be violent or peaceful. What message does the Christian church have […]

  The message of Christmas for us A CHRISTMAS carol tells us to “Deck the halls with boughs of holly … ’tis the season to be jolly”, but the mood for many people this Christmas is far from jolly. Many wonder if ” … happy days (will) ever return” (Straits Times, Oct 20, 2002). Robbed […]

WHENEVER I have to tell someone my denominational affiliation, I usually receive one of the following reactions: “I don’t believe it! You don’t fit the bill. You should join the Anglican Church” (or the Methodist Church, or whatever church to which the inquirer belongs). My response to their well-meaning suggestion is that I happened to […]

IN ORDER to work in Singapore as a domestic help for a two-year period, an Indonesian woman has to fork out 7 million rupiahs (S$1,400) to a maid agency. However, she does not come out with the cash upfront. The moment she lands in Singapore, the family whom she will be assigned to pays the […]

  What is special about stem cells? THERE is nothing, it seems, quite like stem cells. They are capable of developing into any of the many cell types that make up the human body. This potential to be converted into a wide range of specialised cells is widely expected to pave the way for truly […]

HAVE you ever regarded children as being very bothersome? I have and I know many who do, at least sometimes. To the poor eking out an existence, the coming of another child means another mouth to feed. To some young couples, having children means setting up impediments to reaching their goal of a high-flying career. […]

  Is there such life? If it does exist, it must be seen as part of God’s good creation ON THE 20th anniversary of Steven Spielberg’s phenomenally successful “E. T. Extraterrestrial”, there appeared a thriller written and directed by M. Night Shyamalan, whom Newsweek has slated to be the next Spielberg, called “Signs”. Based on […]

THE doctrine of the anonymous Christian is commonly associated with the Roman Catholic theologian Karl Rahner. It refers to the belief that good people of other faiths are in fact Christians except in name. But the anonymous Christians I have in mind are a very different breed. In fact, they are entirely different from Rahner’s […]

A Christian home in old Ephesus: Notice the cross at the top of the entrance. — Picture by the Rev Alfred Yeo.   That is to love God, to do what He requires of us, and to love one another ONE of the most interesting Christian communities in the New Testament is the Christian church […]

How should Christians respond? BIOLOGICAL science crossed a significant milestone at 5 pm on July 5, 1996 when embryologists Drs Ian Wilmut and K. H. S. Campbell and their team at Roslin Institute, a research centre near Edinburgh, successfully cloned a lamb from cells taken from a mature sheep. The technique they used is known […]

THE month of June brought to our globe the excitement and ecstasy of World Cup 2002. Unlike some World Cup finals I have watched, the recently concluded one was not the boring affair that brought the worst out of sportsmen. Instead, it has not only delivered its promise of being a football fiesta but also […]

BISHOP OLDHAM: ‘Christianity must be a religion of spiritual experience.’ — MCS Archives picture.   In his final visit to Singapore during the 1935 celebrations of the 50th anniversary of the Methodist Mission, the venerable Bishop William F. Oldham shared his vision for the future of both church and schools – a view that is […]