Last week after Karen Matthews was found guilty for perverting the course of justice and kidnapping her own daughter, there were pages of newspaper articles about her and the broken life she lived. Some were at a loss to explain it and others outraged by it and others outraged by the outrage. We wondered again about the nature of evil.

I’ve been mulling over some of what I’ve read for a week now and a few things struck me:

1. None of the bloggers I read mentioned it. We’re not likely to mention all of the high profile crimes and crises, but even so. Zip. Two conclusions, I need to read a few more blogs or there’s something of a disconnect between news events and the interests of Christian bloggers. Maybe, both.
2. The Mail (a paper I wouldn’t normally go anywhere near or touch with a bargepole) was typically outraged in its condemnation and disgust. It’s views will be shared and repeated by millions and no doubt a fair few in our nations churches. Here’s a few highlights from just one article:
   

   “Since becoming pregnant at 19 she has had seven children from five, or more likely six, fathers (such is the nature of her life that she appears to have lost count).”

   and

   “She has never married or had a job and always relied on benefits to pay for her drink and cigarettes”

   and

   “Her house was not only a mess inside (with ‘punch holes’ in several doors), but the tiny garden outside was piled high with rubbish.”

   Paints a vivid picture, don’t it? A picture of a woman who was evil long before her plot to kidnap her own daughter. But what happens in a society at the top and the bottom says something about the sort of society we are.

3. I live in a neighbourhood that’s in the bottom 1/3 and nearby is an estate in the bottom 15% of all wards in the UK on social deprivation levels. I can go today to more than a dozen families and houses (that I know personally) and more that I’d have a good guess about, that would fit the above descriptions. Dysfunctional, broken Britain.
4. Question: Where is the church in these places? Mostly, nowhere to be seen. The suburbs and the estates rarely mix and the churches are in the suburbs. Is that fair? I think so.

The whole episode is profoundly disturbing on so many levels and the question that comes to my mind the most is, ‘where was the salt?’ (Mt 5:13)