Edited by Jim McCrory, Sunday 28 December 2025 at 21:20
How Then shall We Comfort Ourselves?
I am on a train feeling lulled by the steady rhythm of the rails. All is well as I quietly read my book when my attention settles on a young mother not far from me. She has two little girls with her. They whisper to each other, swing their legs, exist without self-consciousness. There is something quietly holy about that; innocence unbroken, trust still intact.
At the next stop four men get on and they have loud voices and swaggering bodies. The swearing makes me cringe as they laugh hard. They are performing in a macho circus for no one in particular. I watch the mother’s shoulders freeze at the expletives. The men are not extraordinary and that is, perhaps, the point. Nothing here would make the news. Nothing here rises to the level of crisis.
And yet, the peaceful spirit of the carriage has changed.
I notice the mother shift in her seat, barely visible, instinctive. I wonder whether she ever pauses to think about the kind of world her daughters are inheriting. I’m sure she does. I think the same for my grandchildren. The question unsettles me as it often does. Shame follows close behind. Shame that I feel embarrassed by these men; my fellow countrymen. Shame that I recognise them as familiar. Shame that this, in some small way, feels like a reflection of “us.”
Later, walking up Buchanan Street, the pattern repeats itself. Raised voices. Public aggression. Behaviour that once might have been checked by embarrassment now worn openly, even proudly. Again, nothing extreme. No single moment worth recording. Just variations of a theme all too ordinary. And yet people notice. Especially the elderly and wise.
It is not that society collapses in grand, cinematic gestures. It loosens first. Edges fray. Standards slip. Courtesy erodes quietly. The greater moral decline—the abandonment of truth, of responsibility, of meaning itself—does not arrive announced. It seeps in through a thousand ordinary scenes like these.
I do not believe the UK is sliding morally. That would imply momentum still undecided. I think the collapse has already happened, and what we are living through now is the long aftermath—the strange sensation of being locked into a wild fairground ride. Once it begins, you cannot get off. Some scream. Some laugh. Some pretend the motion is freedom.
The descent continues, not because no one sees it, but because seeing is no longer enough to stop it.
The next morning, I wake at six. The early hour feels tranquil as migrating geese make their presence known in a dark sky. Why do they reflect their makers will; their instinctive wisdom still intact? I prepare for my daily Bible reading as I crave the stillness, craving something solid. The previous day’s thoughts linger, unresolved. Before opening the pages, I pray—not eloquently, not confidently—simply asking for comfort, for clarity, for truth that does not shift with the noise.
I turn to Isaiah, chapter one.
As I read, a question surfaces, not abstract but deeply personal: Can moral and social decline repeat itself? Can a society convince itself it is advancing while replaying the same ancient failures under modern banners? Can people remain religious, informed, articulate—yet hollowed out?
Isaiah speaks to a culture rich in ritual and poor in conscience, loud in self-justification and deaf to correction. It feels uncomfortably familiar. And yet, threaded through the warning, there remains an invitation—not to nostalgia, not to despair, but to return. To remember. To choose differently, even after collapse.
I close the book slowly.
The small signs matter because they point to something much larger. The larger thing matters because, somehow, God is still addressing it. And I am left wondering—not how far the ride will go, but whether anyone, anywhere, will finally decide within themselves to step off…
“Ah, sinful nation… They have forsaken the Lord…” —Isaiah 1:4
How Then shall We Comfort Ourselves?
How Then shall We Comfort Ourselves?
I am on a train feeling lulled by the steady rhythm of the rails. All is well as I quietly read my book when my attention settles on a young mother not far from me. She has two little girls with her. They whisper to each other, swing their legs, exist without self-consciousness. There is something quietly holy about that; innocence unbroken, trust still intact.
At the next stop four men get on and they have loud voices and swaggering bodies. The swearing makes me cringe as they laugh hard. They are performing in a macho circus for no one in particular. I watch the mother’s shoulders freeze at the expletives. The men are not extraordinary and that is, perhaps, the point. Nothing here would make the news. Nothing here rises to the level of crisis.
And yet, the peaceful spirit of the carriage has changed.
I notice the mother shift in her seat, barely visible, instinctive. I wonder whether she ever pauses to think about the kind of world her daughters are inheriting. I’m sure she does. I think the same for my grandchildren. The question unsettles me as it often does. Shame follows close behind. Shame that I feel embarrassed by these men; my fellow countrymen. Shame that I recognise them as familiar. Shame that this, in some small way, feels like a reflection of “us.”
Later, walking up Buchanan Street, the pattern repeats itself. Raised voices. Public aggression. Behaviour that once might have been checked by embarrassment now worn openly, even proudly. Again, nothing extreme. No single moment worth recording. Just variations of a theme all too ordinary. And yet people notice. Especially the elderly and wise.
It is not that society collapses in grand, cinematic gestures. It loosens first. Edges fray. Standards slip. Courtesy erodes quietly. The greater moral decline—the abandonment of truth, of responsibility, of meaning itself—does not arrive announced. It seeps in through a thousand ordinary scenes like these.
I do not believe the UK is sliding morally. That would imply momentum still undecided. I think the collapse has already happened, and what we are living through now is the long aftermath—the strange sensation of being locked into a wild fairground ride. Once it begins, you cannot get off. Some scream. Some laugh. Some pretend the motion is freedom.
The descent continues, not because no one sees it, but because seeing is no longer enough to stop it.
The next morning, I wake at six. The early hour feels tranquil as migrating geese make their presence known in a dark sky. Why do they reflect their makers will; their instinctive wisdom still intact? I prepare for my daily Bible reading as I crave the stillness, craving something solid. The previous day’s thoughts linger, unresolved. Before opening the pages, I pray—not eloquently, not confidently—simply asking for comfort, for clarity, for truth that does not shift with the noise.
I turn to Isaiah, chapter one.
As I read, a question surfaces, not abstract but deeply personal: Can moral and social decline repeat itself? Can a society convince itself it is advancing while replaying the same ancient failures under modern banners? Can people remain religious, informed, articulate—yet hollowed out?
Isaiah speaks to a culture rich in ritual and poor in conscience, loud in self-justification and deaf to correction. It feels uncomfortably familiar. And yet, threaded through the warning, there remains an invitation—not to nostalgia, not to despair, but to return. To remember. To choose differently, even after collapse.
I close the book slowly.
The small signs matter because they point to something much larger.
The larger thing matters because, somehow, God is still addressing it.
And I am left wondering—not how far the ride will go, but whether anyone, anywhere, will finally decide within themselves to step off…
“Ah, sinful nation…
They have forsaken the Lord…”
—Isaiah 1:4
Image by Copilot