Arguments that fail to give any answers

It was wonderful to see letters from Sue Pilgrim and Bernard Barron extolling the virtue of their religions again.

Bernard wanted me to explain the term ‘woke.’ It just means being aware of injustices, like racism.

Justice is simply a convenience of civilisation, it is not an absolute but just because people accept evolution not religion, does not mean they practise injustice against others, in fact most creatures respect others and peacefully co-exist except when they are hungry. Just like humans without God could but we have chosen an alternative, civilisation.

Sue Pilgrim delivered the usual cocktail of quotes from the Bible, cherry-picked to try and make a point but never quite making it.

Like when Covid first emerged it was judgement from God then when human scientists found a vaccine it was “God wants us to live” Yeh! I’m so happy about that.

Like “turn the other cheek” and “an eye for an eye a tooth for a tooth”, as examples of biblical justice, complete opposites but why spoil the story.

Sue Pilgrim and Joanna Trollope usually start their letters with “I wonder (how many)/(if any) readers etc” so I will respond with “I wonder how many readers remember the controversy over the bendy buses circulating Bath”.

Well there is a word, it’s probably not the word of God or his followers, but it is better than all the Latin Jacob Rees-mogg seems to love himself for quoting because it is 17th century English and it is “Circumbendibus”.

It means ‘an answer or argument so convoluted and evasive that it isn’t really an answer at all,’ which is what the Bible excels in repeatedly.

Nicholas Hales

Bath