Huddersfield Daily Examiner

If this is God’s punishment for our sin, it’s pretty mild

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We are going to have a country full of boffins in six months’ time because children will have been taught by their parents on a one to one basis at home and not sat in a class full of 40 other rowdy kids all pumped up on E-numbers after having CocaCola on their Sugar Puffs washed down with a can of Red Bull while the teacher has a nervous breakdown.

Craig T Nelson, actor, 76; Dave Hill, rock guitarist (Slade), 74; David E Kelley, producer and screenwrit­er, 64; Jonathan Agnew (pictured), cricket correspond­ent, 60; Robert Downey Jr (pictured), actor, 55; Karren Brady, businesswo­man/author, 51; David Blaine, illusionis­t, 47; Lemar, singer, 42.

THROUGHOUT the coronaviru­s outbreak, one question has notably been absent – where is God in all this?

Some folk might say it’s God’s judgement on us. In the past Christians have often seen disasters as God’s judgement on sins.

Too often today preachers have offered us merely cuddly God, rather than the ‘Judge of the Earth.’

We all have plenty of sins for which God could justifiabl­y punish us.

To this I have only one reply. If coronaviru­s is God’s punishment, it’s pretty mild. A real hammering would be Ebola or some other plague to decimate us.

Or is coronaviru­s just the first nudge? As an old Seekers’ song has it, ‘God sent a flood, it’s a fire next time.’

Coronaviru­s certainly knows how fragile our whole world order is.

Perhaps our mind-boggling pride needs to be cut down to size.

We blithely think we can take more out of God’s creation than we put in. We feel we are the owners, not the tenants.

But Jesus said that he came ‘not to condemn the world but save.’ Even the stern Old Testament has God saying that he does not delight in the death of anyone.

Maybe the virus is just a wakeup call, to make us turn back to following our Maker’s instructio­ns, rather than just doing whatever we feel like doing.

But the biggest question is simply this, when coronaviru­s is over, what sort of people should we be?

Will we have learned anything?

Will our attitudes and actions have become better?

Disbelief at Council’s planning decision

JUST been reading an article regarding the couple who were refused planning permission for their ‘catio’

Kirklees Council refused to give permission on the grounds that their property is in a conservati­on area, stating that it “would detract from that special character that it’s got”.

I’m in total disbelief at this!! Kirklees Council feels that it is perfectly acceptable to build 22 houses on a conservati­on site, near a school in Linthwaite, surely THAT “would detract from that special character”.

It’s absolutely outrageous!

Is there really any need for 999 sirens?

DOES anyone else find it annoying, that in the present climate with a Sunday morning feel, and given that open roads are empty of traffic, that sirens are sounded, waking you from your slumber, when not always necessary?

I was recently in Hull and marvelled at response services going about adequately with just flashing lights, with an exception for sirens where/ when necessary.

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