Someone with no religious faith or interest might look around our present world and claim 'there is no evidence for the existence of a 'worthwhile' God (who would be powerful, caring and 'hands-on' to dampen down the woes of war, pollution, suffering etc.)'. How might a Christian best address this attitude?

Even people with no religious faith or background can take comfort in 'everyday miracles' ~ though they would probably question that description. Many songs list several such experiences, but only one of these titles continues with words explicitly acknowledging God as creator: which ONE?

People of faith have wrestled mentally with the concept of miracles over many centuries, not least the 13th-century Catholic divine St Thomas Aquinas. Into how many categories did he seek to divide them?

Fervent Christians may not be the only ones to pray for God's miraculous intervention in a seemingly impossible situation; but Brother Andrew, more widely known as 'God's Smuggler' (in his autobiographical book of that title), felt called to a particularly difficult ministry ~ transporting Bibles and other sacred literature into the communist-controlled lands of Eastern Europe, where these were legally forbidden. As he approached the barriers of the old 'Iron Curtain' in the 1950s and 60s, in a Volkswagen 'beetle' crammed with religious printed matter, in what terms would he pray?

'How can anyone hope to glimpse God through the smog and warfare of the 21st century?' How might a Christian best begin to answer this challenge?

'How can anyone these days believe in God creating the world, in the first place?' Again, which answer offers the most appropriate Christian response?

In an instantly visual age, people are (perhaps surprisingly) quick to spot 'images of Christ' in apparently unlikely contexts, where random natural or man-made processes generate a shape that echoes ~ usually ~ a classic traditional image of Him. All of the following, apart from ONE, are contexts in which such images have genuinely been claimed to be spotted within real natural life. Which category is clearly the most dubious?

For some particularly sensitive people, a 'theophany' may trigger acts of creativity which others can enjoy after them, and which these later people may come to regard as a blessing. In 1936 a French composer, orphaned in his teens some 20 years before, lost a dear friend in a particularly unpleasant car accident, and during a planned holiday shortly afterwards sought solace in the sanctuary at Rocamadour. This spiritual experience reawakened and refocused his previous religious sense ~ and he went on to write many sublime religious musical works that have rightly become cornerstones of the 20th-century sacred repertoire (cherished by countless performers and listeners, not least in times of their own trouble). Who was he?

Numerous Bible characters, and others subsequently in history, reported that they had been sent messages from God through their dreams. In the case of Joseph (the Old Testament one), he was released from jail thanks to his God-given ability to interpret the dreams of others (having had many ups and downs in his life already, not least due to dreams of his own). Perhaps it is understandable that the false-reality of dreams, playing in our own minds while we are alive yet not awake, should fascinate and even occasionally scare us. Along came a very famous psychoanalyst around 100 years ago, proposing that all human dreams are self-generated and largely self-ISH with their emphasis on ill-disguised desires, regrets and ambitions. This psychoanalyst happened also, famously, to be of Jewish descent ~ 'one of God's chosen'. Who was he?

A final 'minor miracle' story, again of a church-musical nature ~ but for which your author can vouch, as having been present on the occasion. During the late 1970s Britain suffered a period of industrial unrest which included frequent power cuts. One such evening the congregation for Evensong in the chapel of New College, Oxford had been expecting a service with organ-accompanied choral music, but a power-cut meant the organ could not be blown, and the singing went on unaccompanied, by candle-light, as it had done traditionally all through the pre-electric centuries since the College's foundation by the Bishop of Winchester inStaff outside (and out of earshot) were meanwhile labouring to coax a petrol-driven generator into action to provide some current. By one means or another, the power supply did indeed come back on during the service: the lamps sprang back into action, and those present blinked, rubbed their eyes and smiled at one another. Within the regular service, what words had been sung immediately before that moment?