Volume 13.1

In this issue we start with a mind-stretching article by Chris Bemrose on the redemption of organisations. Can we extend Christ’s work of redemption beyond personal salvation? Scripture tells us of salvation for the nation Israel and grace for the insitution of the Church. Can this extend to organisations? What is certain is that hearts and minds in corporations must be changed.

Corporate accountability appears to be a largely secular and legal matter, but is there a Christian perspective? William Henry looks at legal accountabilities to stakeholders and suggests that the Christian view adds accountabilities to God for the stakeholders.

Our interview this issue is with Catharine Pusey, stemming from her time as Interim Chief Executive Officer of the Employers Forum on Belief (EFB). Jonathan Evens explores with her the practical problems she encountered for employers in implementing the new legislation on discimination on the grounds of religion or belief.

The CABE Hugh Kay lecture was given this year by John Varley, Group Chief Executive of Barclays Bank, and we have a summary of his talk which does not shy away from the controversies of the moment. He concludes that bankers have a chance of getting to heaven!

In this and the next issue we are reporting on some interesting new initiatives in the ‘faith and work’ field. Our new editor Sally Orwin reports on the City Gate Conference which is held in Manchester each year, and here we have a second article exploring the work of Christ beyond personal salvation. The key speaker was an American evangelical, Landa Cope, who proclaimed that the supreme Christ of Scripture shows us that unemployment is a moral disaster, that we must resist stealing time, and yet still enjoy a time of sabbath rest.

Jonathan Martin, an officiating Royal Navy Chaplain and canon of Salibury Cathedral, outlines a new European Chaplaincy organisation which survives on fees from its clients, without compromising its independence – in fact, Marketplace Chaplains are valued for it.

The Copenhagen United Nations Climate Change Conference was seen by most as an ecological disaster. Mark McAllister suggests that the intemperate tone of the debate is counter-productive. Instead, Christian insight and temperance might be brought to bear in accepting fossil fuels as God’s blessing, and as a springboard for investment in alternative fuels.