What is very clear is that NHS staff maintain their exceptional quality of care in the midst of seriously underfunded and collapsing structures. Efficiencies have sometimes led to misunderstandings but more often to improvements, though social care and psychiatric services lag well behind, while (scandalously) hospices depend largely on charity. This from half a century of the myth that tax-cutting is the way to produce economic growth, which has never worked- so now even some right-wingers say they would pay more income tax for a better NHS.
Do we need Charismatic leadership to sort out the problems? Or do “Charismatic” leaders often cause more problems than their simplistic solutions solve? Is plodding, unspectacular, leadership preferable (some would argue that is what we now have- as Labour perhaps had with Clem Attlee in the 1940s)? Does the Church of England need a charismatic next Archbishop of Canterbury? Was Jesus charismatic (as shown by his ability to attract crowds, though often failing to keep them- see John 6, verse 66, for example)? In the New Testament “charisma” (gifts from God) are seen as important, but far less so than the “charisma” of love, patience and kindness (1 Corinthians 12 and 13; Galatians 5, verses 22 and 23).
We read John chapter 1, verses 1 to 14, noting especially verse 5: “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it (or comprehended, or mastered it). Darkness can seem all-pervasive in the world, and the “candles” we light (as with the Amnesty symbol) seem unable to dispel it- but the “hopeful realism” of John’s Gospel (and of all the New Testament) is that though the darkness persists, it cannot destroy the light, and can always be challenged.
One example of obfuscating darkness is the way in our modern economies “value” has come to be defined by price. In her 2018 book “The Value of Everything: Making and Taking in the Global Economy”, Mariana Mazzucato, analyses this, particularly how it ignores the role of government in creating value (social services, infrastructure, research and development). But the myth persists that only “free markets” (these days especially in financial services) are productive.
Keir Starmer’s Labour Party clearly decided that the only way to win the 2024 General Election was to eliminate from its manifesto all traces of the Corbynite challenge to that myth (with “antisemitism” an additional convenient “stick”). The result was a very small increase in vote share from a much lower turn-out (and hence a smaller total vote). Only the split of votes between Conservative and Reform delivered a parliamentary landslide (see the note below). Does this imply that Labour has shackled itself to a global economic consensus that is failing in Europe (unable to counter the anti-immigrant populism), but is desperate to maintain control in Eastern Europe and in the Middle East (so refuses to condemn Israel in Gaza)? Or does it have other options to save it from total electoral eclipse in 2029? Opinions differ radically on that question (see below).
Charismatic Leadership and Democratization (a study of three East European countries- written in 1998): https://ces.fas.harvard.edu/uploads/files/Working-Papers-Archives/CEE_43.pdf
Amnesty International symbol
Mariana Mazzucato: https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/280466/the-value-of-everything-by-mazzucato-mariana/9780141980768
UK General Elections 2017 to 2024:
Election – Labour leader – Votes – Percentage – Turnout – PM elected
2017: Corbyn 12.9 million 40% 68.8% May
2019: Corbyn 10.3m 32.1% 67.3% Johnson
2024: Starmer 9.7m 33.7% 59.7% Starmer (Conservative vote: 6.8 million; Reform vote: 4.1 million)
Two opinions of the Labour government’s economics and prospects: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/nov/06/labour-budget-repackaged-tory-ideas-economics https://bylinetimes.com/2025/01/09/keir-starmers-transformational-political-project-is-being-grossly-underestimated/
Other links which were mentioned in the discussion on January 2nd, but are not included in the above summary:
Richard Rohr: The Vitality of Movements — Center for Action and Contemplation Richard Rohr’s 2025 Daily Meditations Theme: Being Salt and Light—CAC
Jon Sobrino: The Principle of Mercy- Taking the Crucified People from the Cross (1994)- https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25272688-principle-of-mercy
Paul Fiddes: The Creative Suffering of God (1992)- https://www.waterstones.com/book/the-creative-suffering-of-god/professor-paul-s-fiddes//9780198263470