Symon Hill, co-director of Ekklesia (the Christian think-tank) is doing a walk of repentance from Birmingham to London as a pilgrimage of repentance for his former homophobic attitudes and beliefs.

You can help by turning up to one of his talks and events, or inviting him to stay on his route, or inviting him to speak at your church. If it's not on the route, he can still speak on the issues involved at some time after the walk.

Unitarians have been welcoming LGBT people since 1970, and welcoming LGBT ministers since 1977, but it's wonderful to see other churches doing the same. (Recently the Church of Scotland announced that it will allow LGBT ministers.)

Hopefully Symon's walk will raise awareness in all churches of the need to be inclusive and welcoming of LGBT people. LGBT people have many spiritual gifts and creative talents, so it's downright wrong to exclude us. As Desmond Tutu pointed out, this is an issue akin to apartheid.

I just found a fascinating website about the Great Ejection of 1662, with profiles of the ejected ministers, plus sermons and historical background.

The 350th anniversary of the Great Ejection will be in 2012 (something to distract us from the Olympics, I am delighted to say), and doubtless many churches will be marking the anniversary. Unitarians certainly will be.

You may be aware of the controversy over Philip Pullman's new book. The Rev Alex Bradley was quoted in The Independent on Monday 29 March 2010.

The Rev Alex Bradley, of the Unitarian Christian Association, said: "Different people see Jesus in different ways. Everyone to some extent has an image of Him, and writers and artists should be free to form their own interpretation.

"Religious freedom remains indivisible, and freedom of expression remains a core value of democratic civilisation."

Excellent, well said. I blogged about this on my personal blog the other day:

I was talking to some fellow Unitarians on Sunday and we all said how much we are looking forward to reading Philip Pullman's new book, The Good Man Jesus and the Scoundrel Christ, as the ideas in it sound very Unitarian. We also remarked that the Unitarian concept of God is far closer to Dust than to the Authority, since many Unitarians are pantheists or panentheists who believe that the Divine is immanent in the world.

Part of the object of the General Assembly of Unitarian and Free Christian Churches is "upholding the liberal Christian tradition". I once commented that we should also support all liberal religion (which we do through interfaith work and the International Association of Religious Freedom), but since Unitarianism emerged out of Christianity, we do owe something to those roots. And the liberal Christian tradition certainly needs upholding — though the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) and the Metropolitan Community Church are also doing a good job of upholding it.

So I was delighted to see that the Unitarian Christian Association is sponsoring two ground-breaking events:

St Mark's Centre for Radical Christianity, Sheffield: Spring Conference
Nicola Slee - Christa: The Female Christ: Exploring the humanity of Christ through Theology and Art
Saturday 17 April 2010, 10.30am - 4.00pm
At St Mark's Church, Broomhill, Sheffield

St Mark's Centre for Radical Christianity, Sheffield: Autumn Conference
'Mysticism and Contemporary Spirituality'
Saturday 6 November 2010, 10.30am - 4.00pm
At St Mark's Church, Broomhill, Sheffield

Now that's what I call upholding the liberal Christian tradition.

You can find out more about images of the female Christ and the gay Jesus from the excellent Jesus in Love, the blog of Kittredge Cherry, a Metropolitan Community Church minister, and author of several books, including Jesus in Love.

And there's lots of information about Christian mysticism on The Website of Unknowing, the blog of Carl McColman, also the author of several books, including The Big Book of Christian Mysticism.