New champion

I stood outside York Minster today as the new Archbishop of York left his service of inauguration. Dr John Sentamu is a small man with a big reputation. He recalled a comment by a former holder of his post, Dr Michael Ramsey, who had said that he looked forward to when there would be an African Archbishop of York. Today that prophecy was fulfilled by a former judge from Uganda who had fallen victim to the regime of Idi Armin in the '70s. He fled to Britain and began his training for the Anglican ministry. Today John Sentamu was greeted with a colourful service in which he even played a set of African drums alongside a young friend of mine Matt Seymour. In Dr Sentamu the church has a new champion in it's fight against prejudice and fear. He is very welcome here in York and I look forward to the impact of his leadership in the often dull middle class Church of England.

On my desk is a piece of paper from another campaigner who wants to uphold the Christian traditions of Britain and in particular, York. Unlike Dr Sentamu, he feels that these traditions were best served by the homogeneous society that supposedly made Britain great 50 years ago. Homogeneous in his terms means white. He is a candidate for the British National Party. I found the leaflet, pushed through my door, offensive. It implied that the people who had migrated to the UK were the cause of many of the country's problems, by highlighting the terrorist bombings in London this summer. I called the number on the leaflet to register my objection. It belonged to Ian Dawson who told me in the course of conversation that he belonged to the Church of England, but refused to reveal which church he attended. He also gave me some statistics about the number of white girls raped by Asian gangs in Bradford, as though white men had never in history abused black or Asian girls. I requested that no more of his literature be delivered to my door.

Dr Sentamu has received racist hate mail since his appointment as Archbishop of York. The display of the multicultural face of the church at his inauguration in York today shows that he has not been deterred by it.

Rather than vainly hoping to turn the clock back by 50 years, others are facing the future as brothers and sisters from many ethnic origins. Together we are discovering everyone's contribution as we build our future. Dr Sentamu will be prominent with his contribution. Thank you for accepting the call to be the first African Archbishop of York.

Where's the water!!

Squirrels are still damaging the feeders and stealing the seed I put out for the birds. After a time they overcome the obstacles I put in their way - and recently they've been queuing up for their turn to binge at the birds expense.

So I asked the RSPB if I should just live and let live or if they could suggest another deterrent. There's a lot of advice on their website, but this reply from Ian Peters of the RSPB isn't on there. It's a classic solution.

Birds have a very different physiology to mammals and they are unable to taste the chemicals in chilli. This makes it an ideal substance to deter squirrels, as it has no harmful effects but they cannot tolerate the physiological effects. If you treat food and feeders with a mix of hot chilli powder and a small amount of vegetable oil or Tabasco sauce this should condition the squirrels to avoid the food.

So if you see grey squirrels in York gasping for water you know where they've been. Serves them right!

Thank you Tony

A text message left on my phone. "Sad news about Tony Fish. I'm stunned" It could only mean one thing - the guy that had helped me into broadcasting had died. I rang the friend who'd left the message, Sue Owen. .... a heart attack at home.

Tony was two years younger than me and although we first met up in our thirties in York our paths had crossed before. We think we were both at the BBC Engineering Training Department at Wood Norton Hall near Evesham at the same time in 1967. He trained as a Tech Op and I was there on a Technical Assistant's course.

Tony was loud, brash, outrageous and made great radio. He made us all laugh. No one who worked with him will forget his prospects meetings when he was the Programme Organiser of BBC Radio York. "Quakes" was the time to talk about whatever was moving you at the time - passion, anger, frustration, ideas, suggestions were all welcome. It's root was the term that applied to the Quakers who spoke as they were moved by the spirit.

Not that Tony was religious - but he was willing to talk about religion given the right mood. I shall never forget the note he sent to a presenter who played an inappropriate disc in the Sunday Breakfast Show. The song was Summer The First Time by Bobby Goldsboro. The note wasn't written with religious restraint - but graphically described why a song about a young man's first encounter with a woman was inappropriate for a religious programme. The note was often read out at BBC Radio York anniversaries and reunions.

Tony went on to be the Editor of BBC Radio Newcastle and BBC Radio Shropshire before taking early retirement in 2002. He was a real encouragement and mentor to younger editors. He will be missed.

The Lie Clocks

Jon Snow told this joke at the RTS Dinner held in his honour last week.

A man died and went to heaven. Standing at the pearly gates he saw a huge wall of clocks behind St Peter and asked him what they were.
"These are lie clocks," said St Peter. "Everyone has one. Every time you lie the hands on the clock move a little."
"Oh," said the man, "whose clock is that?"
"That's Mother Teresa's clock," said St Peter. "The hands have never moved because she never told a lie."
"Incredible," said the man. "So where's Tony Blair's clock?"
"Jesus has that one in his office," said St Peter, "He's using it as a ceiling fan."

Source: Broadcast

First Person

first person > speakers
This year I have worked in San Francisco and New Jersey. Next year I am in Melbourne for First Person - a digital storytelling conference at the Australian Centre for the Moving Image. I will be drawing on my experience in the BBC to address the conference theme - "first person".

Digital stories differ in many ways from conventional TV storytelling - and one of the most important is the personal narrative - people finding their own voice. They craft the digital story to transform the germ of a story into a two minute piece of television, remaining in control of the editorial decisions throughout the process. In the BBC Telling Lives project about 350 people learned the skills of digital storytelling and made a film. They are all on the BBC site - Telling Lives.

Remember Remember

Who rules Britain? Was that the dilemma facing the king in 1605 when Guy Fawkes attempted to blow up the Houses of Parliament. James I seemed to be more sympathetic towards the Roman Catholics but only a short time into his reign they were being fined and executed for holding onto the old religion.
Would an uprising against the King see a catholic monarch on the throne? What if he could be killed along with his parliament in what has become known as the gunpowder plot. Would this force a change of mind and usher in a more tolerant era?
In the event the plot was foiled, the gunpowder was discovered and Guy Fawkes and his conspirators were captured and found guilty of treason.
Can this struggle find parallels in our modern world. In their production of Remember Remember The Riding Lights Theatre Company told the 400 year old story alongside personal accounts from the 20th century. The Northern Irish troubles and the more recent terrorist attacks on the US and London.
The production unfolded the tensions in England at the time of Guy Fawkes very effectively. Bridget Forman's clever, if complicated script, had me sitting on the edge of my seat towards the end of the play. I left the Friargate Theatre in York feeling stimulated and informed, but not everyone felt the same. Some said that Remember Remember suffered from attempting to be too comprehensive and consequently over intense. Personally I like this aspect of their productions - but I concede that it may not be to everyone's liking.
Remember Remember is on tour until November 27th including six dates in Northern Ireland.

Exploring a Parallel Universe

Following my post yesterday here's a timely article in Christianity Today Magazine that has just dropped into my inbox. It starts to explain the question Why does the word evangelical threaten so many people in our culture? In Britain there's one campaigning group that is daily throwing fuel on the fires of fear and hate. Christian Voice regularly exaggerates the views of Christians and those of other faith and none. As a result it often receives publicity out of all proportion to it's support base. I have written to the leader of this group, Stephen Green, to object to him appearing to represent evangelical Christians. He replied to me and conceded some of the points I had made, but there seems to have been little change to the Christian Voice campaign as a result.
This week I have been training a group of aspiring broadcasters. Just three people, one an evangelical Christian, another a Muslim young woman observing Ramadan. I learned so much about Islam as she discussed her faith with intelligence and real devotion. The conversations provoked me to look at the practice of my faith, and to discuss it with other people on the course. The tolerance shown would stand as an example to anyone who thinks that religion is divisive. In this case it brought us together.

A choice in the wilderness

It was refreshing to read this unsentimental and straightforward account of Christian people who have moved into an inner city area of Manchester. Especially in a newspaper like the Guardian which seems to prefer to demonise or at least be suspicious of evangelicals.