Lift up your head to the future

I did not like history lessons when I was at school - or maybe it was just that I did not like the history teacher! I thought he was a bully. So I gave up the systematic learning of history about 60 years ago.

I came back to history when I retired. I suppose it is inevitable that when we get older the past seems more important to us than when we were young and looking ahead.

I enjoy learning about the "old days" now. I scan the Keighley News briefly each week before turning back to study the Memory Lane photographs. Only after that do I read the news stories.

All the major religions are based on historical events - things that happened in the past and things said by people long ago; things reported in the Old Testament, in the New Testament, or in the Koran. These things are important.

Religion needs to be based on fact and not on fairy story and legend.

However, I also believe that the place for history is in the past. Like the firm foundations of a stable building that are underground rather than on show, so our foundations should be strong but not necessarily ornate.

Many religious people spend so much time looking back at the past that they cannot see what is ahead of them. Others spend so much time with their heads bowed and their eyes closed that they appear to be asleep.

Look ahead; lift up your head to the future; open your eyes to see where you are going; that way we shall reach a shared future unencumbered by the past.

St Paul had the right idea when he wrote to the Church at Corinth and told them of his attitude: "Forgetting what is behind and straining towards what lies ahead, I press towards the finishing line, to win the heavenly prize to which God has called me in Christ Jesus." (1 Cor 9:24).