It is not difficult for church-people to address God as ‘Creator’ — while still children we absorbed the first line of the Bible with unconditional respect: In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth … Modern thinkers, by contrast, treating Genesis as if it were to be understood literally and in consequence, not surprisingly, rejecting it, do not talk about a creator at all. ‘Big Bang’, perhaps, but ‘Creator’, no. Often they simply refuse to enter into discussion about ‘the beginning’ because there is no generally acceptable scientific framework by which answers can be proved.

It cannot be like that for church-people. Whatever else, God IS — that, of course, is God’s name: I AM WHO I AM (Exodus 3:14).

And another thing — very unfashionable these days — follows on from belief and trust in our Creator-God, i.e. the idea of ‘procreation’. It means that God, maker of all things, gives us human-beings the privilege of sharing in the mystery of Creation through our individual acts of pro-Creation. — No small privilege, not to be taken lightly.