Philobiblon

I’ve not been a churchgoer since about age 8 or 9, when I decided to stop going to Sunday school – my parents could hardly argue when I pointed out how dull it was, since they were about to start teaching exactly the same series of lessons for a second year in a row. But everything I’ve read and heard makes it sound pretty hideous, and now even the church has admitted it:

Churches in Britain are a “toxic cocktail” of bullying and terror, as parish priests struggle to lead congregations dominated by neurotic worshippers who spread havoc with gossip and manipulation…. Dr Savage says one of the problems is that churches are hierarchical systems, with all the attendant echoes of feudal society. Thus they elicit bad behaviour such as status seeking, fawning, bullying, passivity, blaming others and gossiping.

So why, one has to wonder, are “church leaders” consulted as some sort of experts on social issues by the media and others?