Monthly Archives: February 2013

Provoking Thought.

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When I first began to seriously write Heirs to the Kingdom, I thought I would take the story that I had built up in my mind over what had been a long period of time and get it down on paper without really thinking about the words I was committing to the file. I know that sounds a little odd for someone writing a book, but at the time I was just doing an exercise to see if I could actually achieve it. There wasn’t any thought of publishing, or even having to talk to other readers of a finished work, it was simply me alone with my thoughts and feelings, letting everything I had kept deep inside me flow into my fingertips. It is still like that today, I cannot allow the thoughts of what others may think to even enter my mind, it has to be plain and simply that deep inner voice guiding my words, and although most of the people reading my work do not see it, it is probably some of the most deeply held parts of myself that come to the surface.

Sometimes a bike ride can help reduce carbon, so each trip you make will help in a small way

Sometimes a bike ride can help reduce carbon, so each trip you make will help in a small way

Personally it can be quite a surprising experience, as things I never actually intend to share come out in the words I put down, of which I would say the most obvious has been the power that is contained in my love for the plant world and the whole of the planet on which we live. Shortly after writing the first two thirds of the Bowman of Loxley, I let a few very close friends read what I had done, and then waited with baited breath for their comments, it was to say the least quite a nervous point in time. I suppose having been surprised myself at what had come out on the paper my insecurity did increase a little, because I had made some bold statements about how we all live within this world, and pointed out a great deal of my private disillusion with the world.

One of my market trading friends Pru was actually the very first person to read HTTK, and she surprised me a great deal when she informed me that it was indeed very thought provoking, and she had thought a great deal about what was written for quite some time after reading it, and that became a bit of theme, as I allowed others to read the first drafts of the first book. I have never forgotten that time, and even though I still do not allow the opinion of others to cloud my writing of the books, I have begun to open up and share a lot of what I feel passionately about in my Blog posts.

The blogs are for me, another way of expressing my thoughts in a none story environment, it’s a place when I can be a little more direct about my point of view, yet remain within the confines of the HTTK themes. I have found that there are quite a few readers who have not read the books, who still read the blog posts, and as a writer it’s another wonderful way of allowing all the thoughts tumbling through my mind to tumble out for another audience.

The story of HTTK is very much the representation of my struggle through life with various issues, especially that of a green campaigner and supporter. I do see the world as two separate sides in these days, and to be honest at the moment I think the side of stone builders is winning. I see a lot of the ways of Mason Knox in the world today, especially in our Governments across the world as they are seduced and corrupted by big large multinational corporations, I think if Mason was indeed a real living person in today’s world he and his evil mother would very much be the people behind the scenes pushing government’s into raping all of the natural resources of the planet on a road that can only lead to the eventual destruction of everything.

I am and always will be a member of the Woodland Realm, like young Robbie in my own early teens I sought to fight those of power to change the world, and even today I still try to educate people in a way that opens them up to what is really going on globally. I have been ridiculed for a great many years for being the Hippie type campaigning for trees and life, and to be honest what felt like insults in my youth, I wear today as my badge of honour. I have campaigned for petitions and protested and even at times employed a few Specialist tactics under cover of darkness to strike one for the green cause, although these days I am getting a little too long in the tooth for covert activity, and my mind has turned to thinking about other solutions.

Writing is certainly one of them, it’s a little warmer sat at the computer than walking the cold streets handing out leaflets, and I also look at today and the way the world has changed so much since my youth, and ponder as to whether there is a better way for all of us to live together in a more balanced way.

In the UK this week, we have been told that over the coming years we will see our bills rise to an unprecedented level because as our natural gas supply runs out, and old coal power stations are taken offline, we will need to import more gas from the continent. It’s a reality that in a world where those like the Knox family, have corrupted every system, and brought the global economic climate crashing down to the benefit of themselves. Once again the poor of this country and countless others, will be forced into the hardship of bearing the costs, and the costs are not just financial, they are also a cost to the world we live in, a cost that will punish our future generations.

The biggest argument I face is that in this world of technology, people will not support an environmental point of view, because even though they are not calling the government’s into question over their lack of effort on the environment, they have embraced all the new technology so much that to take an environmental road will deprive them of the little joy they have in life these days. When you look at the wide range of products we have available to us, it is a valid point, let’s face it communication and labour saving devices have never been so good, and our lives have been transformed by all of them, but surely there has to be a way forward for all of us to do our bit.

It can appear like a double edge sword, either we change drastically and give up everything, or we continue on the road towards destruction, but really do the choices need to be so stark?

I think not. Why is so impossible to see that the environment and technology can walk hand in hand. In my books I take the best from the old

We can make a choice that uses the best technology to balance our lives, with very little change to the wat we all live

We can make a choice that uses the best technology to balance our lives, with very little change to the way we all live

world and add it to the natural world, in a way that benefits people and yet has little impact on the world, why is so hard for the UK and other countries to follow the same lead? Oil does not have to be the future of everything and neither does Gas powered, I am very anti-nuclear, simply because it’s just too expensive and as we have seen in Japan, it’s not quite as safe as we thought it was. Britain is considering fracking as a gas alternative, but that is actually banned in many European countries because it has been proven to be far more harmful to the water table than our Government are admitting. We have already had one large scale earthquake caused across Yorkshire and Lancashire because of the early drilling; do we really want to destroy and poison the North West of England?

We need jobs to get the economy growing again and take the pressure off the benefits system, as well as move away from the old fossil fuels, so why are we not looking towards Germany for inspiration? Literally on our doorstep, we have so many solutions that are good for everyone that it must provide a way that leads to jobs and cheaper fuels for all. In Germany they invest heavily in green technology, not only do they encourage solar power plates on homes, they have solar farms, which they combine with wind power to create a substantial amount of clean green energy. Ok the costs for setting it up have been high, but let’s be honest, it has to be better to pay UK citizens a good wage and build and install these systems rather than just paying our money to an Eastern European country for extra gas. Wind power across the globe rose by 20% in 2012, Ok so there are a great deal who hate the sight of windmills; personally I think they look a lot better than the gaping holes we create for strip mining, or the sight of large Fracking drills. I love windmills I have to confess, I want a small one on my house, I will probably paint it to look better than just plain white, but yes as soon I can afford it, I will get one simply because it will drop my household bills over time, which means I can invest in more fun tech for me and the kids.

The environment and technology can work as partners, and benefit all of us, but it takes a slight change of thought before we can implement it. Governments can change their view when they see that votes will not go their way, and it is up to all of us to finally make that stand and point them in the right direction. The future of this planet can only come with the will of the people, and it is up to everyone to share the information that will eventually force governments to change their mind. We have to abandon our complacency and apathy towards the way we choose to vote. It can be done as we have seen with the banking industry recently; as it was the public’s opinions that forced the government to make changes that are finally bringing them into line, and caused some very high profile job dismissals.

You make not like the way they look, but its a hell of lot nicer than drilling platforms of a devastated landscape

You make not like the way they look, but its a hell of lot nicer than drilling platforms of a devastated landscape

Just imagine this small point. This country has a huge amount of public buildings, what if we all made it clear that the government should fit solar panels to every one of them.  Have you any idea how many jobs that would create in fitting and manufacturing them? Do you know how much pressure that would take off our old and rapidly decaying oil and gas burning power stations? New technology can be environmental, and a shift such as this would not change the life of anyone, but it would do a massive amount towards reducing carbon emissions in this country, let alone globally. There is a very important lesson to be learned from some of HTTK, and it shows that we can share the best of every world and create a sustainable future for our children and our grandchildren’s generation, it just takes a few moments to think about it, and then voice your opinion, which funnily enough was what the hippies were saying forty years ago, It kinds makes you wonder why we didn’t listen?

There is always another way forward if you take the time to think about it, and then get out of your seat and do something about it. If you look hard enough there are so many other ways to improve our lives and the planet we all share, and whether you believe it or not, it does not belong to those like Mason Knox, it actually belongs to all of us, its home to seven billion people.

 

Taking Stock.

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There comes a time in every man’s life, where it is time to stop and take stock of all you have done and achieved, for most men it is a single event that comes around forty, and it is an important moment as you look back at all you have done, and with a little hope the picture is pretty good.

I have done it a few times in my life; I often think that was due to the fact that I had to change direction often, as deep inside me there were important changes going on brought on by changes in my life. My first break up from a long term relationship, losing my job after 12 years of hard grafting loyalty, fighting a council to save my business, all of them exacted huge changes that made me stand up and take notice, and forced me to drastically alter the way I lived. Within the past two years two events again have made me sit and focus on what is important in this life we live, and I feel it poses as many questions as it answers.

I think most of us take Nature for granted, and I think within that lies a note of caution, because Nature holds all of us within a delicate balance, something brought home to me in the hardest possible lesson recently as I watched my first daughter suffer, it was a reminder that had been served to me a year earlier as I watched my father struggle when he nursed my Step Mother back to health, and from those hard and painful times, I have started to understand the true value of the gift we all call life.

A recent survey I read (Which I cannot find the link to. If I do I will add it later) listed the five biggest regrets men had on their deathbeds, and one that struck me whilst reading, was the high proportion of men who wished they had not worked so much. I think it resonated so deeply within me, because in the childhood of my first daughter I worked at large Garden Centre, and the job which I loved took me out of the home at weekends and holidays, and also involved almost dawn till dusk working hours, as a result I missed all of those important moments watching her grow up. The sad thing was it wasn’t even worth it, I worked so hard and was without doubt one of the most loyal members of staff, but when it came down to the line, the owner let me go simply to save money in a budget cut, where he kept on the cheaper members of staff. OK in the long run he lost out, after all I was the one who brought in the sales, and to a large degree could justify my long working hours with my wage, but it hit me hard at the time, and it knocked me flat on my face for a long time after. I vowed then I would not work for another employer again, and began to set up my own business.

I learned an important lesson, one which I was lucky to get earlier in life than most other men, and when by what I see as a miracle, I became a father again later in life, I knew I was not going to pass up the chance of a lifetime to enjoy the life of my new child. Today I write from home, the money as a writer is not great, I do not live as well in comparison to my days working in a large Garden Centre, but I am surrounded by my family, and even though it is a struggle at times and I do worry about what happens if my books do not sell, I still think by comparison I am a lot happier than I was back then. It does pose the quality versus quantity argument as to which approach is best, and yet being by my wife’s side and enjoying the freedom to take my children out and watch them as they excitedly investigate the world around them, for me is something of extra special value, as I now want my time here with all of them to count.

As most of you know I love Celt culture and tradition, and one thing in particular that I am reminded of at the moment, is how they believed you should honour your ancestors and all who have been before you. To the Celts, it is the sum total of each member down your family line that has brought you to this point in your life, it is a profound thought when you sit and think of the lives of your family dating back through each generation, In a way I think it is a very important point that most of us have forgotten.  In heirs to the Kingdom I used the phrase, when I leave this realm, I will sit in a place of honour at my father’s table, it is a reference to this the oldest of Celt traditions and it is something that is a deep part of my own personal beliefs. Again it poses the question of when I finally leave this realm, what will make me worthy enough to earn my place at the table?

I know a few people who have worked hard all their lives, and in many cases they have built themselves up quite a business or small empire to show the world the worthiness of their achievements, and you cannot react in any other way than to admire the courage and determination they have shown in achieving such a feat. But at the moment I do question whether or not it was worth the sacrifice and effort, because I can only ask what will happen when they are finally gone? The cost they pay to achieve such a thing is very high indeed, and in most cases behind every successful business man, is a divorce or unfulfilled wife, and children who really do not know who their father truly is a person, it feels like a heavy price to pay for success to me.

History teaches us that all empires fall, so is it even worth building one in the first place? That at the moment is a question I have no answer to. Something that I think about and is important to me is the example set by my father. His father died when he was a small boy, and I often think of how my father worked his way up in his job to finally reach the top position, it was not an easy journey as he began at the bottom. Along the way he earned a great deal of respect, due mainly to his even handedness of those he managed. He spent a great deal of his free time in the Mountain Rescue, again playing his role as a team member saving the lives of a great many people. Is his father sat in another realm watching with pride? I would say a very resounding yes; my father has indeed earned his place at the table, because even when he is no longer with us, as a result of his life, other lives have been touched and changed by the way he lived.  As you can probably imagine I am very proud to be his son, and I can only hope that one day I will measure up to him, and all that have been before me, and take my own seat at the table that is the legacy of my family line.

I have lived quite an unconventional life, I am a natural rebel and I have lived a life without too much planning, taking in the moment and trying to make the best of it. I have always felt we place far too much emphasis on money and possessions and how everything appears to others, we are indoctrinated from when we are small children as to what is and is not acceptable, and yet those who teach us these so called important rules for life, disregard them completely and are usually the ones who obsess over money and gather great possessions, whilst breaking every rule ever set for what is deemed to be acceptable moral or otherwise. It is their way to control us, and I think today we are seeing that clearer and clearer as we watch corrupt governments and religious leaders lie and cheat to gain power and wealth for themselves, and the banks and business grow ever larger under the rule of their fat cat owners, as inequality and injustice are heaped upon the rest of us, so why should we live our lives at their benefit? The world has become obsessed with celebrity culture and the material gains they flaunt, I mean lets be honest why does the sex life of a celebrity really matter? Who cares if they have had an affair or slept with ten people in one night, I mean really does it matter that much in the scheme of things that they spent ten million on a marriage that lasted only fifty days? Focus on your own sex life and enjoying it, and make yours the one marriage that no matter what trials you have, it works.

Is it not more important to live as feels right for us?

Shouldn’t we all live in a way that honours those who came before us? I think it is time for change, and it should start by all of us taking stock of who we are, and what is more important to us. For myself, it is important that I leave something behind that my children and wife will never forget, it is also important that I earn the respect of my father and earn my place at his table. I am lucky I am a published author, I will leave something behind, my words will remain on file in the central library of the UK forever and so future generations of mine will be able to read the words I have written and share in my world, for my books do contain my life and my feeling and thoughts, even if they are written in a way that is encrypted to the rest of the world. More importantly I want my children to hold the respect for me that I hold for my father, that is the legacy I want to leave them, I want the memories to be of happiness as they remember how I introduced them to Nature and showed them how to use the tools we have to create and build things, and also to remember the lessons I learned in life to aid them and prevent them making the same endless mistakes I have. I want them to live free of thought, and not shackled by the rules of the institutions that have crept into this world and dominated opinion for generation after generation.

The one thing I am very proud of is my thirty year role around plants. I have sown millions of seeds, taking hundreds of thousands of cuttings, and travelled this country selling them on cheaply to people who have taken them home to plant and grow on with care. As I look out of my window across the woodland and wild fields, I can see countless trees that have been planted by me, some of which are now growing into early maturity. I have collected and scatted millions of wild flower seeds across this land, and helped revive some flagging varieties by reintroducing them back into the wild, and I have fought and campaigned to save trees all around the world, so when my moment comes to walk out of this world into another one, I will know I am leaving it a little more beautiful than when I came into it. That is one thing I am immensely proud of, and even though no one will ever truly know the extent of my life with plants, I have left something behind me which with hope will remain as a marker to my life for many years to come.

Be UniqueThe one thing I have learned more than anything else in the past 18 months is that life is precious, and it should be lived to its fullest. It is so unimportant what others think, being true to yourself and living every moment is far more important, because we really do not know when Nature will slip and the balance will change. The media is filled with endless opinion on what is and is not acceptable, but the daft thing is, it is only at that moment of time that it appears relevant, all the shocks and scandals we see blow over in days as the news rolls ever on, and it is the same of life, none of it really matters, but your family and its past heritage will, so honour it and those around you, by being true to yourself. It does not matter how you live, what is really important is that you live it well.

The Celts believed: Respect all of nature and every living soul. Live your life to its fullest, and hurt none. It is a ten thousand year old piece of advice, and to be honest, it is still the best piece of advice I have ever read.

Point of faith.

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Every now and again I get a comment, usually from a Christian about how anti-Christian my writing is. I must admit I tend not to take up the argument with them, as from previous experience I have found that those who have what I see as a blind faith, and are not at all open to a grown up discussion about religion, and in most cases they have not read my books in their entirety and have only been alerted to certain passages, which is very frustrating for me at times.

If they would sit and actually listen, they would find that I am not against their religion at all, if anything I find the concept of their belief fascinating and would relish a good conversation, it’s just I want to talk openly with someone who for want of a better word, is not simply preaching off an indoctrinated mantra at me.  Most people do not take the time to listen to my observations of the Christian religion, and so therefore just sit and quote what feels like well-rehearsed lines of defence, as taught them through what I see as the institutions of doctrine. It is the one thing I dislike the most, as I am more interested in their own personal spiritual beliefs, not the same old flawed series of points and quotes as brandished by every member of the clergy.

I love the human race, nothing is more fascinating than what makes us all tick, and yes I have spent a life talking to find out more about what all of us feel inside and think about the planet we all share as home. I have a deeply spiritual side, and so at times its wonderful comparing notes, I suppose at the end of the day, we all want to know how alike or different we are to each other.  I love nothing better than to sit and read, and believe it or not, I have read the bible, possibly much more of it than those who preach their religion and choose to argue with me. It may also surprise a great deal of people to find I was raised in the faith and was quite involved in it from an early age. I am indeed an ex Altar Boy and Choir member, and believe it or not I served as a replacement Sunday School Teacher for a year in my early teenage years, so I have indeed experienced Christianity from both sides of the Altar rail.

I chose to seek another path, its a personal choice based on my observations, and I do not preach that everyone should take the same path, I never would because I feel very strongly we all have a journey of personal spiritual discovery to make, and no other should be able to influence it, but for the record I will share a little of my own personal insight. In my teenage years, which I found to be a time of strong emotional turbulence and questions, I asked my vicar for answers, and rather than sit and talk to me as another human being, I was treated like an inferior and lectured, and told to forget and ignore what was essentially a very natural process of development that I was going through, even if I didn’t realise that at the time.  As a result I began to search out my own answers, and the facts I discovered changed my thoughts and feelings about Christianity forever.  Later I discovered Paganism, although I am still uncomfortable with the word Pagan, which in my mind was a derogatory word used by the church, to address people who were seen as lesser because of their beliefs, and I coined the term Earth Faith to more accurately describe my beliefs at that time, although as with many terms used in the past, Pagan has become a term used and accepted by everyone today.

I looked at the facts of Christianity and found so many contradictions and acts of misuse that I felt it would not suit me as the person I had become, and that is still very much true of today. Do not get me wrong, I really do not have any problems with those who wish to follow the Christian path, there is much within the teachings that even today I still live by, the Christian ideal does provide a good blue print of how to be a better human being and live within this world, I just find a world that also serves and balances within nature is more suited to my spiritual belief system and works better for me.

I am writer, and it is the experience of writing and editing which in many ways when mixed with the facts helps me to gain a better understanding of how the words of Christianity were spread across the globe. Let’s face it the Bible has become the foundation stone of most of what we see as the civilised world, You could even say that it is the most powerful book ever written, but it is within that simple fact that my biggest doubts were formed. I suppose the natural researcher within me was not given the satisfaction it sought, and from looking at just pure facts, I very quickly came to the conclusion that many of the details of early Christian text came about through human error, and so therefore over the last 2000 years more and more errors have led to what has become the foundation of society, let me elaborate a little.

2000 years ago the only way to make a book was to sit and handwrite it all down, and then bind it together, which is how the very first gospels were created, many of those early copied handwritten gospels survive today in one form or another. My problem lies in the fact that the only way to copy those first gospels was to copy them by hand, and it is here in that small fact that my experiences of being a writer takes over. It is simple human behaviour that when copying a text by hand natural mistakes are made, something I know well from my own experience of writing. The brain runs slightly faster than the hand, and if you are reading and writing at the same time there is no doubt whatsoever mistakes will be made, its completely unavoidable, and if you doubt that then try spending a whole day sat copying a book down on to paper, you will find there will be more errors that you ever imagined.

So take the very first books of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, as written by those very disciples and copy them, and the result will be an original book with mistakes, because there would have been errors in the very first copies, so we have a copy containing the original mistakes and also new ones made the person who copies it. Add to that the fact that the original books were written in Aramaic, and had to be translated into as many languages as was required to spread the word of Christ, and suddenly your second generation copy gives birth to many wrongly translated copies, all of which will be copied to increase the amount of books that would be required to spread Christianity and enable it to grow as it has over the years.

I think it is safe to say that when the books were translated from Hebrew, they had already been copied countless times and so had become riddled with mistakes, and also translation is not an easy thing, a great deal of the time translating a book requires the one doing the translating to make adjustments so that the books become an interpretation of the Aramaic text, and again the books change and distort from that original copy of the gospel.

My concern grew from the fact that books were copied probably thousands of times by hand before we reached a time where printing was possible, and at that point when a modernising Church made the decision to print a new revised copy of the Bible, which I believe was somewhere around 1611, well over a thousand years had passed and the handwritten books they had were deeply flawed and not a very close resemblance to the original books. I find that alarming, because this one book has set the laws and rules of behaviour that modern society had been built upon, and yet this version also had to be approved by not only the church, but also the government of the day, it is a very flawed version of events that has deviated away from what was written in the originals.

It is fact that today there are countless thousands of handwritten copies of the New Testament held in museums, and places of study all over the world, and no two are the same, every one of them is completely different, which possess the question just which one exactly is the closest to the one’s written by the disciples? The oldest copy of the New Testament dates to about two hundred years after the death of Christ, and it is just a small fragment of paper containing a few dozen lines, and they do not match up that accurately with what we read today. I find that to be quite a disturbing fact considering how important the Bible has become as a moral and social compass to modern day society, and it is something I find difficult to accept.

That is just one of my own personal feelings about the bible, and it is not one I have ever asked any other to agree with, but when I add to that, the endless contradictions I found in the Bible, such as “an eye for an eye” compared to “Turn the other cheek” and love each other as you would yourself, one can only ask the question which one do I follow? The simple fact is that there are thousands of contradictions, which leads me to believe that it is so open to interpretation, that you can pretty much use any aspect of the Bible to make an argument to sustain any point of view you please, be it degrading women, burning witches or wiping out other religious faiths by pronouncing them as Satanic, even though Satan is a Christian creation who has nothing to do with other faiths. The one fact I do know to be true about man is that they will interpret things to bend to their own will and gain them the best of any situation, and sadly I do feel very strongly that is the truth of the institution we all refer to today as “The Christian Church.”

I am no fan of the church, the past is documented with the facts of how they have abused their power to control and hurt the masses, even in the modern world of today, and I have to confess I see them now in the same light as I would any other multinational corporation, and to be honest they have not provided any of us with actions to prove me wrong. All I see is the mantra of their god, used to increase their profits, gain land and exert more control over the people, which is why I am not interested in the spin of mindless Christian Mantra and would much more prefer a conversation about how a person feels personally about the faith they own as their own as an individual and how their belief helps them through life.

At the time of the life of Jesus, who I do believe was a real person alive at that time, there were also many people who acted as commenters on life around the world, and yet in all of the manuscripts (Which unlike the gospels, are the original handwritten texts that have survived) there is no mention at all of Jesus, the first real reference comes over two hundred years after his death. Maybe it is me, and yes this again is my own personal belief, but if Jesus was the man we have been led to believe, such as a man capable of working miracles, do you not think these people would have heard such tales of wonder and reported them at the time?

None of them did, which I feel possibly can be interpreted into the fact that Jesus was somewhat of a local hero, and it was those locals who held him in such high esteem that they chose to remember his life by writing about it. I find it hard to believe he was the son of a god who lives in some realm above us that science cannot detect, I do believe as the Dead Sea Scrolls infer that he was indeed the son of a Roman noble, who for want of a better words became a champion of the poor in his local vicinity. If the bible is correct he was a very well educated man for his time, and that would have gained him a huge amount of respect, I certainly feel he had great wisdom, and many of the things he taught at that time are still very relevant today, and yes all of us can benefit from his words, but as for being a deity, I am sorry, but I personally cannot accept that at all, but again for those who do believe I really have no issue with that.

I chose to walk a different path from Christianity many years ago, and it is one I feel is a more natural approach to every living thing on this planet, for I feel that to supress a natural feeling or urge as the Church instructed me to is an unnatural way of being. Through Pagan belief I found I could embrace and express myself as a person openly without judgement and live more in tune with who I am, and that for me made a huge difference to my life at a difficult time. We all have one life on the planet, and as we live we form our own natural affinity with what surrounds us, and through that we take a path of spirituality that serves us best, mine is Earth Faith, but that does not mean I am anti-Christian or any other religion for that matter, what it means is that I am aware of who I am as a person, and I acknowledge and accept the responsibility of all I feel and all I do. I am by no means perfect, my life has been a struggle like everyone else’s, and is littered with bad judgement and mistakes, but I have learned wisdom from all I have done, and when my time here comes to an end, I will have that wisdom in my final breath and it will ease my passing into something else.

The core ethics of Christianity offer everyone a sense of hope, and a path that embraces everything and everyone you meet, I think I can safely say as do all religions, and yet it is my observation that especially in the world at this time, we are placing too much emphasis on an individual’s spiritual beliefs, and it is being used as a weapon of division, one I feel is detrimental to the human race. I do not believe any religious views should be used to judge an individual or be used as a means of control. I do not believe that a religion should have the power to dictate government policy, or be applied on mass in schools. I feel very strongly that spiritual belief should be kept within the confines of the family home, and be chosen to fit the individual. There is too much hate and pain created by these so called religions of peace and love, and I do actually think that the leaders of each religion should be more accountable for the institutions they run and get their houses in better order, because the hate is preached at a higher level than the love these days.

So if you are one of those who has pointed the finger at my writing and sat in judgement of me because of it, please consider this. Believe what feels right for you as one unique person, and if that is Christianity then that is right for you, and I am happy you feel that way, but please do not make snap judgements about me because we do not serve the same god. Christianity limited my view of myself and the world, and so I searched for a path that I could identify with, and yes at times it does appear in my writing, its bound too because I write from the heart of who I am, and through my writing I try to share some of the wisdom that has helped me through life.

I feel my writing in Heirs to the Kingdom has shown all sides of the coin, at its heart it is a story of a Pagan Woodland peoples who have to fight to protect their way of life, against the survivors of a post apocalyptic Britain, who wish to resurrect the old modern ways of man. Yes I have shown some corruption within the Church of Christianity, but I also feel I have shown the kindness and love from the other side of the Church, pay more attention to Sister Mary and Father Warren, and you may find yourself surprised, especially in some of my views of tolerance towards each other. I write about my own country, which for the time being is a predominantly white Christian country, I dare say if I lived elsewhere, lets say the middle east, maybe my story would focus on Islam rather than Earth Faith, the simple truth is I write what I know, and I know Christianity and Paganism enough to be relatively accurate, I will admit as a writer I do have the liberty of fudging a few facts to aid the flow of the story, but saying that the religious belief is still only a tiny part of the story as a whole.

Finally I will state for the record, that my own personal belief is that all of us should believe in something, not necessarily the same something, but I feel we all have a spiritual side that should be nurtured as we would every other aspect of ourselves. If yours happens to be Christian or any of the other faiths, then more power to you. This world lacks a great deal of tolerance, as we have seen in recent times, we show a lack of wisdom and understanding in many aspects of life, such as sex, gender, sexuality, and religion, would it not be wonderful if we all embraced each other’s uniqueness, and tried a little harder to get along, maybe then we can all sit down and have wonderful and fulfilling conversations about life and all the many wonders that come with it and live more peacefully as one race with more harmony.