The same page includes material in which I point out that the Christian doctrine of redemption makes absolutely no allowances for young people - 18 to 24 year olds and younger, no allowances even for babies. Orthodox doctrines which condemn adults to eternal separation from God (or Hellfire) also condemn children and even babies to the same fate. The next Bishop of Durham will need to do some thinking on the topic. The next Bishop of Durham will need to be challenged on this and a range of other issues.

Two versions of history: secular, ecclesiastical, with images

The ecclesiastical version of history, Church of England version, has the advantage of coming from an institution with power and influence, with massive financial advantages - but rapidly diminishing power, no longer very influential and financial advantages which could rapidly turn into crippling financial losses.

It still manages to manage history, to some extent, to convince some people, too many people, that the saints really were the people most to be admired, with achievements greater than the people in secular society. This is unadulterated rubbish.

In Durham, St Cuthbert plays a leading role. There are many people from the distant past with claims upon our attention, and claims to be respected and admired, even if, very often, they had far less desirable qualities.

St Cuthbert lived in an age - an age lasting many centuries - which was credulous, superstitious, barbaric, disease-ridden but with strange notions of sanctity and holiness. People with modern outlook are often ready to forget the advantages of modernity and to imagine that those times were ages of profound spirituality

Above, St Cuthbert, from a wall painting of the 12th Century in Durham Cathedral

Cuthbert lived from c. 634 to 687. He was a monk, bishop and hermit. He eventually took up residence in Inner Farne island near Bamburgh, where he lived an austere life. The necessary context is generall overlooked. This was at a time when the vast majority of the people lived a life that was not so much austere as poverty-stricken. Large numbers of them lived in horrific circumstances. St Cuthbert must have had far more leisure than these people. Unlike St Cuthbert, they had to work unremittingly to support themselves and their families. To begin with, he received visitors, but later he confined himself to his cell, sometimes opening to give a blessing.

The secular world can demonstrate values and achievements far more worthy of admiration. I don't overlook the fact that the secular world, like the ecclesiastical world, can be deficient in so many ways but I'll mention some achievements free or virtually free of any significant drawbacks or weaknesses.

Monks continued to pray give blessings and to exist throughout the years of the First and Second World War, in Germany as well as the allied countries, but essential freedoms were fought for by people with very different priorities.

This stark image shows Men of the 9th Durham Light Infantry clearing resistance in the village of Wesek,  Germany, 29 March 1945.

After the war, Field Marshall Montgomer wrote,

'Of all the infantry regiments in the British Army, the DLI was one most closely associated with myself during the war. The DLI Brigade [151st Brigade] fought under my command from Alamein to Germany ... It is a magnificent regiment. Steady as a rock in battle and absolutely reliable on all occasions. The fighting men of Durham are splendid soldiers; they excel in the hard-fought battle and they always stick it out to the end; they have gained their objectives and held their positions even when all their officers have been killed and condition were almost unendurable.'

 

I challenge the Church of England's continued role in public Remembrance events. Church doctrines on redemption has consequences which are generally ignored. According to these doctrines, British and other allied forces who fought Nazism were redeemed if they had accepted Jesus as Saviour. Otherwise, they were not redeemed - in orthodox doctrine, consigned to hell. Similarly for people attending Remembrance events where a Church of England cleric leads the service. Of the people attending the service, only the ones who have accepted Jesus as saviour are saved.

 

Changes to this pattern are long overdue. There's absolutely no justification for holding Church of England services in public spaces, ignoring the fact that only a very small proportion will shore these beliefs.

 

This is a map showing the British Coalfields of the 19th century.

 

To many, many people, including, I'm sure, many environmentalists in the Church of England, coal miners are people involved in pollution, enemies of environmental values, perhaps.

Miners were people who powered the railways, which made it possible to transport food and other necessities of life, and the steam ships which, unlike earlier ships, were not at the mercy of the wind. The achievements of the coal-powered industrial revolution are incalculable.

Their work was very hard, gruelling and dangerous, if made less hard by mechanization and less dangerous by technical advances. It could never be made safe.

Again and again and again, Christians claim that people are entirely to blame for environmental problems, that people have damaged and destroyed God's creation.

We can blame the (non-existent) Christian God for 'creating' a world in which a material which was essential for such a long period was mainly deep underground, to be recovered only by dangerous, back-breaking work. This country was at least well endowed with coal. The case was different in the case of foodstuffs. His creation was miserly. All that was available was a very limited supply. Potatoes and many other foods had to be brought from other continents.

The Durham Miners' Gala remembers and celebrates people and achievements well worth remembering and celebrating.

The price paid by the miners was extreme. For a very good piece on mining disasters in the coalfields of Durham and neighbouring areas, see The Northern Echo page

https://www.thenorthernecho.co.uk/history/
mining/disasters/

which has a Pit Disaster Timeline and this Introduction:

There were around 30 major colliery disasters in Durham and Northumberland in the period 1800-1899 claiming the lives of more than 1,500 men and boys. Gas explosions were the major danger, although some incidents were caused by collapsing mines. The six worst disasters of the period in terms of numbers killed were - 204 killed at Hartley near Blyth (1862), 164 at Seaham (1880), 102 at Wallsend (1833), 95 at Haswell 1841, 92 at Felling (1812), 76 at Burradon (1860) and 74 at Trimdon in 1882.

The worst disaster of the twentieth century occured in 1909 when 168 died at West Stanley. Pit ponies were often killed in the disasters including 181 killed in the 1880 Seaham disaster. A list of the major disasters from 1708 to 1951 is given below, but almost every colliery could produce long lists of men and boys who lost their lives in smaller, individual incidents.

The area of which Durham forms a part is a remarkable one. One achievement which is  significant in the Industrial History of this country - and in other aspects of history, Social and Economic History, even including Humanitarian History - is the Stockton and Darlington railway, which of course was only possible because of the availability of coal.

Quite a number of constructions connected with the railway, rolling stock, bridges, buildings, remain and can be visited.

These are wonderful:

This is the Seal of the Stockton and Darlington railway, a modest record of extraordinary achievment

Coal from the inland mines of the Durham coalfields was originally transported by packhorses, until roads were improved sufficiently for horses and carts to be used.

The Stockton and Railway was the first public railway in the world to operate with steam trains. The first line of the railway connected collieries near Shildon with Stockton and Darlington, beginning in 1825. Coal was transported to various places, including ports, for powering ships. The line was financially successful and soon it was extended to a newly constructed port at Middlesbrough.

Coal waggons were hauled by steam power from the start of operations. Passengers were carried in horse-drawn carriages to begin with until passenger carriages hauled by steam trains were introduced in 1833.

 Achievement in engineering, including innovation in engineering, was notable too. George Stephenson was the Chief Engineer, and designed the Gaunless Bridge for the Stockton and Darlington Railway.

This has strength, but not beauty, I think. It's hard to ignore the diameter of the pillars, excessive for the support of their loads but inevitable at a time when much more slender supports couldn't be attempted, given the unavailability of engineering formulae to use for the calculations. These are prosaic matters, I realize, but they play a part in my response.

The view of the exterior is much more interesting, exciting - and attractive. The strength of the towers is complemented by the vegetation and the waters of the River Wear.

The view above, from College Green, isn't nearly as impressive, for me.  I think the massing (of masonry) is undermined by the  fussy projections, miniature and minuscule spires.

Only a small proportion of people who visit Durham Cathedral will be members of the Church of England or some other church. The great majority will be firmly rooted in the secular world. I'd hope that some of the visitors - the more the better - will realize that this is a place which penalized the secular world. Most of the believers who work there or come to services there will have the belief that only visitors who have Christian faith will be redeemed. The others will have the fate I've mentioned on the pages concerned with Chrisitanity.

Visitors will obviously have to pay the admission price to see the interior. I think it would be a mistake to give anything extra. When people visit a church or a cathedral which doesn't charge for admission, visitors can avoid giving any money with a good conscience. Donations given to the church amount to money which could have gone to a much better cause but hasn't.

The Durham Diocese and Catholicism, the Catholic Church and abuse

The long ecclesiastical history of Durham is for many centuries a Roman Catholic history. The Church of England gains advantages - but I regard them as severe disadvantages - by stressing the historical connections, the remote past. The Anglo-Saxon period is more obscure than the recent past, or the medieval period, for that matter. It can easily be supposed - wrongly supposed - that in those distant times, the blessings of the church were many and various - prayer, more prayer and even more prayer - the church as a 'powerhouse' of prayer, the celebration of the sacraments, not forgetting hermits and people who had taken a vow of silence, supposedly colourful and interesting.

Was abuse, of the kind described below, unknown? Surely not. It's overwhelmingly likely that abuse was worse in Anglo-Saxon times, in an era uninfluenced by modern humanitarianism. Slavery was endemic in Anglo-Saxon times and the saints of that time, undeservedly celebrated, did nothing about it. Much later, in the medieval period, slavery merged with serfdom but in Anglo-Saxon times, an owner of slave men, slave women and slave children could abuse their slaves and punish their slaves with very few hindrances.