Sir, – Attending the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland for what will be my last time after a gap of 20 years was a profoundly depressing experience and I can see why it is no longer televised live.
The Church of Scotland shows a total lack of moral courage in allowing its ministers to be in a same-sex marriage but insisting they must not conduct such a marriage ceremony.
It exports another “ethical problem” by allowing Swiss medics to help its parishioners dying in extremis but bitterly opposes such merciful release if it takes place in Scotland.
Attempts to indicate the scientific incoherence of its global- warming alarmism are shouted down and green purity clearly trumps fuel poverty among the old and the vulnerable.
There is a moral obscurantism about this fading organisation and I look forward to the day when a cleric ignores its unctuous dictates and marries a gay couple in his congregation.
Rev Dr John Cameron,
10 Howard Place,
St Andrews.
Kirk has lost its bearings
Sir, – I used to think of the Church of Scotland as a Christian church, located in Scotland.
Now I think of it as an attempt to embody the values of secular Scotland in the external form of a church.
This conclusion is based on consistent and repeated evidence.
Every time contemporary popular values diverge from biblical Christian principle, the Church of Scotland chooses to follows the crowd.
Where the Bible does not have any clear teaching to offer, the Kirk follows the crowd anyway.
Our so-called national church is happy to pay ministers who do not believe in God, and deny biblical teaching on sexuality and relationships.
But this same Church of Scotland can confidently affirm that we should remain in the European Union and refrain from smacking children.
There is nothing wrong with social clubs, charity work, musical societies, left-leaning liberal campaigning organisations, philosophical discussion circles, or historical re-enactments but, without Christian faith at the centre, they do not constitute a church.
Richard Lucas.
11 Broomyknowe,
Colinton,
Edinburgh.
Housing draw for teachers
Sir, – The sole reason we decided in 1968 to apply to become teachers in Angus was that it was one of the local authorities offering Scottish Special Housing Association houses to teachers and other essential workers.
We are still here.
David and Sandra Affleck.
7 Lord Lyell Drive,
Kirriemuir.
Power put before people
Sir, – Last week a former chief scientific officer to the Scottish Government stated that the “overwhelming scientific consensus” is that GM food is safe to eat.
Part of the support for that stance is from a report released by the US National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine based on the analysis of 900 research studies.
The report has been described as a “380 page debunking of unscientific claptrap”.
Now I expect my elected representatives to attend to such information and to use their superior knowledge and understanding of it by virtue of their position and their countless special advisors and then use it to lead their constituents to a better life.
And, in this case, also help better feed the world’s expanding population.
However, it seems, rather sadly, that the SNP government prefers to follow the often irrational, even hysterical , popular prejudices of its supporters in order to hang on to power.
The same stance has been their reaction to fracking.
Nicola Sturgeon’s own expert panel on the issue stated in 2014 that there was no good reason to oppose fracking, which would make us more energy sufficient and lessen our reliance on oil from the unstable Middle East.
I understand that the post of chief scientific adviser to the Scottish government has been vacant for 18 months.
Does Ms Sturgeon not need such advice? Or is it that she does not want it because she might lose some support? Or is the post vacant because no scientist would want to work with a government which panders to popular, uninformed opinion just to hang on to its power?
Mona Clark.
9 Millbay Terrace,
Dundee.
Fine reckless dog owners
Sir, – A Staffordshire bull terrier bit 11 children in a park in Northumberland and one needed surgery.
More than 100 sheep were killed in a sheep-worrying incident in England.
In 2015, 120 incidents were recorded where guide dogs were attacked by other dogs affecting the guide dog’s ability to work, costing the guide dogs charity £650,000.
Dog-related injuries are reported daily and across the UK, councils collected 66,000 strays.
There are 8.5 million dogs in the UK, a number which is increasing as designer dogs and multiple dogs become the new status symbol.
A brake needs to be put on these numbers and an annual £50 licence fee for every dog might see some sanity return.
To safeguard children, councils should insist that dogs be kept on a short lead in parks and play areas.
Dogs now have to be micro-chipped so a dog licence would be the next logical step.
The penalty for a dog not being micro-chipped is £500, so a similar amount might deter the dog owner who recklessly allows their dog off the lead in public areas where children run and play.
Clark Cross.
138 Springfield Road,
Linlithgow.
Case not made for electric cars
Sir, – Once again Gordon Pay resorts to obfuscation and misquoting (May 25) when challenging the content of my earlier letter in which I questioned where the electricity would come from should there be any significant utilisation of electric vehicles.
Firstly, he implies that I used the term “useless renewable energy” when in fact I stated “useless wind turbines”.
Secondly, in response to my concern about the electricity grid operating with an extremely low supply-over-demand safety margin, he claims electric vehicles have the potential to help without explaining how.
Finally, he closes by raising a unique situation in Portugal where unusually bad weather conditions involving heavy wind and rain resulted in renewables, mostly hydro, meeting local demand for a few days.
Exactly what that has to do with electric cars and grid stability in the UK is not made clear.
GM Lindsay.
Whinfield Gardens,
Kinross.
What about women’s clubs?
Sir, – Nicola Sturgeon has rightly condemned Muirfield Golf Club for its vote to continue its male-only membership rule.
Why is it, however, in these days of sexual equality, nothing is said about Scotland’s 22 women-only golf clubs?
Could it be that there is no chance of the chaps voting for her but the ladies might?
Allan Sutherland.
1 Willow Row,
Stonehaven.
Fear saved us from ruin
Sir, – Nicola Sturgeon has made one of her most high-profile interventions to date in the EU debate and immediately started criticising the tactics of the United Kingdom Government, clumsily seeking to dismiss them and all her opponents in the Scottish independence referendum.
Our First Minister refers to the lessons of the Scottish referendum saying “fear-based campaigning, that starts to insult people’s intelligence, can have a negative effect”.
Yet, wasn’t that fear-based campaigning warning us, among other things, about the reliance on overblown oil revenue assumptions upon which the SNP’s case for independence was knowingly based, and which subsequent events have clearly shown would have led to a financially ruinous outcome for Scotland?
And when the First Minister talks of insulting people’s intelligence, she surely means the many other unbelievable claims made by the SNP at that time about everything from continuing membership of the EU, the half-baked case for a currency and the timescales and costs for separation from the UK, which were clearly a total fabrication
Keith Howell.
White Moss,
West Linton.