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Thought for the Day for Holy Week 2023

Monday

Matthew 21.4-5 “This took place to fulfil what was spoken through the prophet: “Say to Daughter Zion, ‘See, your king comes to you, gentle and riding on a donkey, and on a colt, the foal of a donkey.’”

A humble king demonstrating soft power. We don’t associate gentleness and power. The word Matthew uses is often translated meek; but that word is also used of the ox harnessed to a plough, and so means strength harnessed to purpose. Jesus comes to Jerusalem with strength and purpose. Here he will confront the powers that be, from religious authorities who fear him, to a Roman Governor who pities him.

Tuesday

Matthew 21.12-13 “Jesus entered the temple courts and drove out all who were buying and selling there. He overturned the tables of the money changers and the benches of those selling doves. “It is written,” he said to them, “‘My house will be called a house of prayer,’ but you are making it ‘a den of robbers.”

Strength harnessed to purpose, remember? Money-making in the holy place; the noise of bartering and selling and the clinking of shekels drowns out the psalm singing and the prayers. Those tables stand for all the business and busyness that leaves no time or space for God in our lives – and they should be overturned!

Wednesday

Matthew 21.15-16 “But when the chief priests and the teachers of the law saw the wonderful things he did and the children shouting in the temple courts, “Hosanna to the Son of David,” they were indignant. “Do you hear what these children are saying?” they asked him. “Yes,” replied Jesus, “have you never read, “‘From the lips of children and infants you, Lord, have called forth your praise’?”

One way or another, the vice jaws of power will crush the upstart Nazarene. WE now read the story knowing how it will end. The signs are ominous. Those who have the power to prosecute (Chief priests) and execute (Pilate) are already moving into place. And Jesus denies nothing. Instead he says the children simply shout the truth. Holy Week is about the confrontation of truth with power, the truth of who God is confronts the truth of what human beings are capable of.

Thursday

Matthew 26.26 “While they were eating, Jesus took bread, gave thanks and broke it and gave it to his disciples, saying “Take, and eat; this is my body.”

The simplicity of the action is completely normal, but made emotionally stunning; its meaning heart-breaking as it dawns on his disciples. Jesus knows this is the last meal he will share with them. Then the wine, “This is my blood of the new covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sin.” When we take communion, we replay the reality of those words, real then, real now, for us.

Friday

Matthew 27.31-2 “After they had mocked him, they took off the robe and put his own clothes on him. Then they led him away to crucify him. As they were going out, they met a man from Cyrene, named Simon, and they forced him to carry the cross.They came to a place called Golgotha (which means “the place of the skull”).

No matter how often we read this story, it touches deep into who we are, and what we believe about God. “For God so loved the world that he gave his only son.” Unlike Simon who had no choice but to carry someone else’s cross, Jesus calls us to take up the cross and follow him. “Were the whole realm of nature mine that were an offering far too small. Love so amazing, so divine, demands my soul, my life, my all.”

Saturday

Matthew 27.59-60 “Joseph of Arimathea took Jesus’ body, wrapped it in a clean linen cloth,and placed it in his own new tomb that he had cut out of the rock. He rolled a big stone in front of the entrance to the tomb and went away.”

Silence. It is finished. Nothing is happening. Hope is extinguished. The rock thuds into place. What now? Holy Saturday is the day that seems to last forever. Twenty four hours in which the whole creation groaned, awaiting its redemption. The darkness that fell on Golgotha has deepened, inside and outside the grave. Death has won, the powers that be get their way. They always do. Unless…No, “It is finished.”

Sunday

Matthew 28.5-6 “The angel said to the women, “Do not be afraid, for I know that you are looking for Jesus, who was crucified. He is not here; he has risen, just as he said. Come and see the place where he lay.”

Ah, now it is finished! The unfolding drama of redemption comes to its climax in front of an audience of the two Marys and a couple of Roman soldiers knocked senseless by events a universe outside their experience! Life is let loose, and has invaded and conquered the darkest prisons of death. This is a world where resurrection has happened, where love and life and light can finally and fully eclipse hate and death and darkness. “Thine be the glory, risen conquering son.”

3 April 2023
“Emptied Himself of all but Love…”: Holy Week and the Kenosis of the Son of God.
Lectionary Texts for Passion Week.
- First reading
  - Isaiah 50:4-9a
- Psalm
  - Psalm 31:9-16
- Second reading
  - Philippians 2:5-11
- Gospel
  - Matthew 26:14-27:66 or Matthew 27:11-54
What are we to make of the contrast between the One who ‘was in very nature God’ and the one who ‘became obedient to death – even death on a cross’? Why would “he who did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped” make himself nothing and take the form of a servant?

Unless we ask this question we ourselves haven’t grasped what Paul is on about in this passage. “Made in human likeness, he humbled himself.” Again, why? Charles Wesley taught us to sing the answer, “Emptied himself of all but love, and bled for Adam’s helpless race…Amazing love! How can it be?”

And in one of Graham Kendrick’s finest lines, “Hands that flung stars into space, to cruel nails surrendered. This is our God.” So that’s why. The self-giving love of the Triune God.

The diamond pivot of this passage is the word kenosis, which has caused no end of discussion amongst biblical scholars and theologians. It means to empty, to become nothing. It refers to the self-emptying of the One who in obedient love to the Father, refused to cling to divine prerogatives. This is Paul at his most daring as he explores the divine heart of the Triune God. But not because he is interested in theological speculations about the pre-existence of Christ. He has a far more practical purpose.

Paul is writing to a church he loves and a community that loves him. But it’s a congregation in trouble. There are factions and differences of opinion, relationships are strained and for all the talk of unity, two prominent leaders, Euodia and Syntyche are at loggerheads. Paul wants them “to agree in the Lord” (4.2)

So this prose poem about the eternal glory of the Son of God, is the story of the coming of Jesus in the incarnation, his full humanity, ministry and crucifixion for the sins of the world – a story Paul now tells straight into the life of a congregation as a critique of self-assertion, a rebuke for broken relationships, and an encouragement to “be likeminded, having the same love, being one in spirit and purpose.’

Pastorally, how can people who have fallen out with each other be helped to realise this isn’t the way of Jesus? What argument could persuade those split into opposing factions, and riled by party spirit, to think differently about each other? Is it possible to tame the ego, or in Paul’s words, how do you tell people “Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.”

Before Paul begins that astonishing story in 6-11, of how it came to be that the Son of God became the Son of Man, he raises the bar of Christian behaviour to its highest level: “Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus.” (2.5) So that’s the goal to strive for, the true prize of the high calling of God, the gold standard of Christian obedience; to have the mind-set, and motivations of the One “who because he was in very nature God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped.”

The Lectionary links this passage to a Psalm in which the Psalm-poet anticipates the realities condensed into those few words of Paul: “he became obedient to death, even death on the cross.” (See Psalm 31.9-16) The Psalm is a cry for mercy, and a prayer of obedient surrender: “My times are in your hands.” (15) Whatever happens as a result of being obedient and faithful to God, the Psalmist who has humbled himself and become obedient to God has the confidence to pray: “Let your face shine on your servant, save me in your unfailing love.” (16)

The inner thoughts of the Psalmist echo the other Lectionary passage from Isaiah 50.4-9a. The words of v 6 describe with uncanny detail, the experiences distilled into those five words, “even death on a cross.” Anticipating the words of the Servant Song in Isaiah 53, Isaiah’s words expose the brutality and cruelty that characterise human sin at its most imaginative, and vile.

“I offered my back to those who beat me, my cheeks to those who pulled out my beard, I did not hide my face from mocking and spitting.” But. “Because the Sovereign Lord helps me, I will not be disgraced.” (Isaiah 50.6)

And so back to Philippians and those five words, this time plus one, “even death on a cross. Therefore…” The hinge point of the story of Christ is embedded in that word of eternal consequence – “Therefore”. The humble one is exalted; the servant is enthroned; the one made in human likeness is given the name that is above every name; the crucified is exalted. The unfailing love of God, revealed in the humility of the eternal Son, triumphs over all and every other name and power.

The final Lectionary reading from Matthew 27.11-54, is the long story of the passion; the One “who made himself nothing, took the very form of a servant “and ”became obedient to death, even death on a cross.” Holy Week contains the long unfolding in history of Paul’s prose poem in Philippians 2.6-11. From triumphal entry, to the Last supper, from Gethsemane to Calvary, and from the Saturday tomb till the Sunday resurrection morning, we follow in the footsteps of the One who made himself nothing.

Why? For love of all that God has made. Wesley, as already noted, shows deep theological instinct: “Emptied himself of all but love, and bled for Adam’s helpless race.”

(This piece was commissioned for Goodfaith Media, and published earlier this week as a reflection on the Lectionary Readings for Holy Week. The reflections are based on the Philippians text in conversation with the other texts. You can access the published version here)
2 April 2023
Valuing the Classics in Historical Theology
A wee glimpse of one of my bookshelves; then a second glimpse into the work ethic of one of my favourite New Testament scholars of a past generation.

Vincent Taylor's trilogy Jesus and His Sacrifice, Atonement in New Testament Teaching, and Forgiveness and Reconciliation, still sit on one of my theological classics shelves, alongside:
- H R Mackintosh The Christian Experience of Forgiveness,
- Emil Brunner, The Mediator,
- James Denney, The Christian Doctrine of Reconciliation,
- P T Forsyth, The Work of Christ,
- A B Bruce The Humiliation of Christ,
- D M Baillie God Was in Christ.
Taylor's trilogy is still one of the most thorough explorations of the work of salvation as expressed in the New Testament. Yes, scholarship has moved on, by quite a distance since the 1950's. But Taylor, and the others mentioned are important witnesses to what it is we do not move on from as those seeking to follow faithfully after Jesus;, which is the centrality of Jesus Christ in Christian thought, faithful Christian existence, and that practical and grateful obedience to the Love of God in Christ that is so richly explored in such historical theology.
Now, Vincent Taylor's work ethic. His magnum opus was his monumental commentary The Gospel According to St Mark. He was often asked how he managed to complete the massive task of writing a commentary of just under 700 pages, mostly double column small font. The answer is a lesson in industry, and in the cumulative effects of small goals regularly met:

"Taylor had a firm belief in the principle that a regular accumulation of small drops will eventually-and more quickly than is often supposed-fill a vessel of considerable size. During the ten years he devoted to the production of his monumental Commentary on St. Mark’s Gospel, his aim was to complete ’ one quarto page

per day ’-and seldom did he fail to do so (later, upon his retirement, Dr. Taylor applied a similar method to the task of shifting fifty tons of soil from the front gate to the back garden of his bungalow at St. Annes-on-Sea !) (Expository Times, vol. 75, Issue 6, page 164)
1 April 2023
The Blessing of Brief Encounters with Lonely People.

Sitting on a bench looking at this yesterday.

An old local worthy stopped by, accompanied by one of those joyous dogs, a brown cross Springer spaniel and Border collie.

In ten minutes he spoke of a life in the merchant navy, on a fishing trawler where he went overboard and barely survived, his loneliness and at times overwhelming sadness following his wife's death some years ago, his dog's liking for burns, culverts, puddles and other places to get filthy, his skirmishes with the Council about their various shortcomings in keeping the beach clean.

Came away glad he had stopped to speak, and pleased to have listened to those parts of his story he felt able to tell to two strangers.

31 March 2023
Praying for Our Country to “Act Justly, Love Mercy and Walk Humbly before God.”

I've just listened to today's full Statement to the House of Commons by the Immigration Secretary Robert Jenrick, and to an hour of the subsequent debate. The Statement set out Govt plans to create several more large bases to accommodate "illegal migrants" who have arrived via "small boats."

The blanket phrase "illegal migrants" recurred with almost liturgical import throughout the 7 minute speech. He was concerned about those who "abuse our generosity", and the "eye-watering cost" of hotel accommodation which would "act like a magnet to millions of people displaced and seeking better economic prospects."

Repeatedly he pitched the plight of those arriving on small boats against "the British people", emphasising the "cost to the hard-working British tax-payer", the "security concerns" the need to act in the national interests and "fundamentally alter the posture towards illegal migrants."

At no stage was there the slightest acknowledgement that the word illegal has no relevance to people seeking asylum and refugees. His tone in both the Statement and his responses was divisive and as good a demonstration of "othering" vulnerable people, as much else that is being spoken by Government ministers, all the way up to and including the Prime Minister.

He wants to stop "illegal migrants from breaking into our country". In reply to the response from the Shadow Home Secretary, “They would make the United Kingdom a magnet, there would be open doors, an open cheque book, and there would be open season for abuse.”

I came away from an hour of this wondering about the future of a country exposed day and daily to rhetoric that dehumanises, lacks the cogency of compassion, and is fuelled by anger and self-righteous claims about "standing up for the British people. A deliberate rhetorical strategy which chooses words carefully for their push-button effect on some of our most negative feelings towards those we are being encouraged to fear, resent and "other".

And as a Christian and a citizen, a tax-payer and one of those Mr Jenrick claims to be speaking for, I challenge the arguments he uses, and reject the discourse of division, and refuse to have my ethics so badly misrepresented.

Over the past 18 months, I and others in our church community have had much to do with numbers of people seeking asylum and housed in a hotel a few minutes walk from our church. I've listened to stories, looked at photographs, struggled over language barriers, talked of separated family, shared coffee and companionship, tried to find ways of making life less bleak and more hopeful. These are human beings, with inherent worth and a right to live without fear, people with hopes and gifts, deserving of at least a hearing, and until then, treatment under-written with dignity and respect.

I refuse to sign up to the language of "othering", the rhetoric of resentment, and policies aimed at making life harder for people already vulnerable. "He has shown us, every human one of us, what He requires: to act justly, to love mercy and to walk humbly with God." Aye, that.

29 March 2023
Lent with R. S. Thomas: “the opposite of poetry is not prose, but science.”

You could be forgiven for thinking that R S THomas was a Luddite, a hater of technology and the mechanisation of life. The machine is manufactured, and Thomas was deeply fearful of what "man" "makes" in factories, what machines do to the land and to the human soul.

Many of his poems are ambivalent about science, even more uncertain about technology, fearful and mistrusting of human knowledge applied for the purposes of mastering nature by machinery and mechanisation, rather than serving creation by care and stewardship. He had lived through the years of war, of the tractor replacing the horse, the combine harvester devouring fields in half a day that would have taken men a week with scythes, twine, forks and sheaves, and further days of toil at the threshing mill.

His deeper fears focused on human applications of physics, the creation of the atomic bomb, the deploying, as threat, of nuclear weapons capable of destroying human life and earth as a viable home. Picking mushrooms reminded him of the mushroom cloud, and the white domes of early warning systems.

The laboratory was a place where power and domination were exercised over matter, so that the same power could be exercised over other people, peoples and nations. Like George MacLeod, Thomas had no hesitation in seeing the splitting of the atom, and nuclear fission, harnessed to military ends, as blasphemy, the turning of the fundaments of life to the ends of mass death.

The opposite of poetry is not prose, says Thomas quoting Coleridge, it's science. Jesus was a poet, he argued, implying much that we are left to ponder. "Jesus was a poet, and would have teased the scientists, as he teased Nathanael". Nathanael was the disciple 'in whom there was no guile', sitting under the fig tree, whether thinking, praying, waiting. (John 1.43-51) But the allusion to Nathanael and his waiting under the tree provides Thomas's entry point for one of his ironic and apologetic critiques of the scientific enterprise, the technological mentality, the mechanistic worldview.

His quarrel wasn't with science, but with science as dominance, technology as efficiency, lust for knowledge unrestrained by humility. His late poem on the theme of science as both wrong question and wrong answer shows he is not an obscurantist opposed to science, discovery and learning. The poem considers the futility of science as an explanation of ultimate concerns (he was in well-read dialogue with Paul Tillich). Science and technology are not of themselves a sufficient basis for human flourishing, and are not to be trusted as guarantors of a human future. This from The Echoes Return Slow:

*

"Because Coleridge had said that the opposite of poetry was not prose but science, that was what he preached from the pulpit at times, his eye straying through the leaded window to the sea outside that passed and remained always. He defended himself with the fact that Jesus was a poet, and would have teased the scientists as he teased Nathanael."

*

I have waited for him
              under the tree of science
and he has not come:

            and no voice has said:
Behold a scientist in whom
            there is no guile

I have put my hand in my pocket
                for a penny for the engaging
of the machinery of things and
                it was a bent
penny, fit for nothing but for placing
                on the cobbled eyeballs
of the dead.

                 And where do I go
                 from here? I have looked in
through the windows of their glass
                 laboratories and seen them plotting
the future, and have put a cross
                 there at the bottom
of the working out of their problems to
                 prove to them that they were wrong.¹

"I have…put a cross…" At the centre of Christian faith is a truth beyond the powers of science to explain or even explore. The cross is a symbol of all that is wrong with the world; how can the answers be right if all the workings and working out are based from the start on false premises, incomplete data, and skewed purposes. The cross is also a symbol of all that is right, at least insofar as the Cross is God's way of confronting the self destructive impulses that go back to the beginning when under another tree, the knowledge of good and evil was filched from God.

This is a poem that absolutely requires biblical literacy to be able to hear the potent theological and biblical sub-texts. As a Lenten poem it could be a call for us to adopt a far less sanguine view of human technological ingenuity, as in its rapid advances it outstrips our moral maturity and wisdom. And in place of intellectual hubris, a Cross, that symbol of the marker that something is so wrong in the conclusion, that the questions and answers require deeper and better thought.

1. R. S. Thomas. Collected Later Poems, Bloodaxe, 2004, page 56.

29 March 2023
Wild Geese and the Restless Longing of the Heart

It was 7.30 in the morning, over 30 years ago, when Dorothy rung my doorbell. She was dressed as always, immaculate hair, mohair cardigan, blue chiffon scarf and her favourite brightly coloured long skirt. She tugged my arm, urged me to come outside and look up. And there flying over the West End of Aberdeen, against a frost blue sky, a long skein of geese, honking their way north. “Would it not be fine to be able to do that” she asked, her eyes bright with the thought of such wild freedom. I hope I’m as alive as her when I start pushing eighty!

The wild goose is a Celtic symbol of the Holy Spirit, expressing the freedom and urgency of God, and the homing instinct of the human heart. “You have made us for yourself, and our hearts are restless till they rest in You”, said Saint Augustine. His words, a millennium and half later, still speak to the restlessness and God embarrassment of people not sure what we want, but full of wanting.

The American poet, Mary Oliver understood the frustration and desire that give our hearts colour, edge and the rich texture of emotional and spiritual longing. Her poem 'Wild Geese' ends like this:

Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,

are heading home again.

Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,

the world offers itself to your imagination,

calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting –

over and over announcing your place

in the family of things.

About that restlessness, Jesus said, “I have come that you might have life, life in all its fullness.” Two thousand years later Jesus still dares us to take flight, and fly, and live, and find our home in God.

28 March 2023
A Poem from a Bookshelf.

Just for fun I rearranged some book titles on one of my bookshelves. The picture is a woodcut of The Annunciuation, with Mary studying and being interrupted!

A Poem from a Bookshelf.

The Humility of the Eternal Son

Space, Time and Incarnation

God the Revealed

The Go-Between God

Love’s Endeavour, Love’s Expense

Divine Humanity

Jesus, Humanity and the Trinity

The Creative Suffering of God

Christ the Key

Fountain of Salvation

Saved by Faith and Hospitality

27 March 2023
Thought for Each Day This Week: “the darkness is passing and the true light is already shining.”

Monday

I John 2.7-8 “Dear friends, I am not writing you a new command but an old one, which you have had since the beginning. This old command is the message you have heard. Yet I am writing you a new command; its truth is seen in him and in you, because the darkness is passing and the true light is already shining.”

An old apostle, remembering a long time ago, a new commandment spoken by Jesus, “that you love one another as I have loved you.” It’s old, but it’s renewed every time we obey it. This letter has more about the love of God, and our love for each other than anywhere else in the New Testament. Love isn’t an option; it’s a command. Get on with it!

Tuesday

1 John 2.9 “Anyone who claims to be in the light but hates his brother is still in the darkness. Whoever loves his brother or sister lives in the light and there is nothing in them to make them stumble.

Light and darkness, love and hate. In this one area of human relationships there is black and white. To hate is to live in darkness; to love is to live in the light. Every time we act or speak in love “the darkness is passing and the true light is already shining.

Wednesday

1 John 2.15 “Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, love for the Father is not in them. For everything in the world—the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life—comes not from the Father but from the world. The world and its desires pass away, but whoever does the will of God lives forever.”

“The world” in John’s thought isn’t the created world. It’s that way of ordering life in opposition to God. When we make idols of money and possessions, crave for power, live selfishly and competitively. The world is human life organised without reference to God. If we love a world with no time for God, it’s hard to claim we love God. All that the world tries to possess will pass away; doing God’s will has no sell by date.

Thursday

1 John 2.20-21 “But you have an anointing from the Holy One, and all of you know the truth. I do not write to you because you do not know the truth, but because you do know it and because no lie comes from the truth.”

Every believer is anointed by God, set apart for holiness, truth and love. John is urging his people to have confidence in God’s touch on their lives. God is true, and Jesus is the truth. We know it and we know him, and so we live by the truth that sets us free and enables us to see clearly the light and love of God.

Friday

1 John 2.24-25 “As for you, see that what you have heard from the beginning remains in you. If it does, you also will remain in the Son and in the Father. And this is what he promised us—eternal life.”

That word ‘remains’. Another of John’s favourites. It means to abide, to stay, to dwell and make your home. Abide in Christ, make your home in the fellowship of the father and the Son through the Spirit. Eternal life is to share the life of God. Paul’s way of saying this is that we are in Christ, and Christ lives in us. A life of fellowship of fellowship with God is heaven!

Saturday

1 John 2.28 “And now, dear children, continue in him, so that when he appears we may be confident and unashamed before him at his coming.”

Stay in Christ, right where you are. Continue in trust, love, prayer and service. In other words, keep going. When it’s tough don’t give up. When tempted don’t give in. The truth of the gospel, the anointing of the Holy Spirit, love for the Father, walking in the light, loving our brothers and sisters, trust and confidence in Christ – stick with these and you will not be ashamed to meet the Lord when he returns is glory.

Sunday

1 John 2.29 “If you know that he is righteous, you know that everyone who does what is right has been born of him.”

As Christians we are known by how we think, speak and act. Righteousness describes a life in which truth, light, love and faith are obvious. The life we live is so transparent that others can see right through us and se Christ. We are God’s children, says John: so act like it. God is Love, so love as you have been loved by God. God is Light, so shine with the brilliance of the Light of the world.

…………….

May the mind of Christ, my Saviour, live in me from day to day,
by his love and power controlling all I do and say.

May the word of God dwell richly in my heart from hour to hour,
so that all may see I triumph only through his power.

27 March 2023
Moderating the Discourse of Large Organisations With Power Over the Welfare of Others.

I remember in the early 1980's, the only time I ever invigilated O levels. The subject was metalwork; the noise was excruciating with 20 pupils wielded hammers, hack saws, and metal files as they produced the required right angle brackets.

The teacher who had to stay outside the class was pleading for some latitude in the time part of the test, referring to some in the class as "wee inadequates." At the time I thought it was what we might call inappropriate stereotyping – nowadays it would be considered a much more serious breach, discriminatory and even derogatory.

So why on earth is it acceptable for Ofsted to use a one word summary of a school as "inadequate"? And that without further qualification. I know the gradings are shorthand. But that in itself is a concession to the brutalisation of public discourse and organisational evaluative terminology.

The word now is that the one word bottom line will be reviewed. Two very important considerations have to be balanced:

1. The concerns and responsibilities of Ofsted who:

Provide independent, up-to-date evaluations on the quality of education, safeguarding and leadership, which parents greatly rely on to give them confidence in choosing the right school for their child." (Dept. of Education)

2. The wellbeing and welfare of School, Staff.

"Many head teachers are getting 'very ill, stressed and having breakdowns' as a result of inspections and 'that's not acceptable under any framework'. Ms Price-Grimshaw, who used to be an Ofsted inspector, said it was "impossible for teachers and head teachers to raise standards if they're feeling broken, demoralised, stressed and anxious". (Julie Price-Grimshaw, School Improvement Adviser).

Those responsible for enhancing the quality of education are obliged, by their own educational claims of excellence, to take a lead in creating a culture of co-operative and supportive collaboration in the evaluative process. That starts by ensuring the language used in final reports values, respects, supports, enables and empowers school leaders and teachers.

Ofsted are given significant powers to do their job well. The job is not done well when those powers crush instead of nurture the very people who can implement recommendations for improvement. Or so it seems to me.

The back story to this can be found here, on the BBC website

24 March 2023