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Good morning. What makes a person who has strong opinions change their mind? This week I read the obituary of a man I had never heard of before, Ray Hill. As a young man with no prospects he got caught up in right wing politics and became anti-Semitic and racist, eventually joining the neo Nazi movement. Then he did a dramatic turn around, realised he had gone terribly wrong and to make amends became a mole in the organisation, responsible for exposing it to public view and virtually breaking it-at some risk to his own life of course. What was so telling were the experiences that led to this reversal. First, in South Africa, pursuing extreme politics, he fell on hard times-and was looked after by- Jewish families, with whom he became life long friends. Then he saw a totally destitute Indian family being turned out of their house with their few possessions, which he realised was the result of his activities. These two experiences totally changed him. To be open to change we have to be willing to ask questions-to question the assumptions of the groups to which we belong, and especially to ask questions of ourselves. This week I saw an enthralling new play about the greatest questioner of all time, Socrates the great Athenian philosopher. Normally Plato’s works about him are gathered together under the title The Last Days of Socrates but this version, by Howard Brenton is called Cancelling Socrates and is obviously directed to the cancel culture of our own time, when some people simply refuse to hear certain points of view, blocking their ears and minds. Socrates was condemned to death. And what was his offence? Simply asking questions, questions about the fundamental values we should live by, the assumptions of the society to which we belong, and ourselves. People have sometimes drawn a parallel between the death of Socrates and the death of Jesus. One difference is that Socrates posed questions in philosophical form, Jesus told stories and asked people to reflect on where they stood in relation to those stories, and with whom did they identify in them. He wanted people to see themselves as they are and, to use the old word repent. Unfortunately, the word repent has got twisted in meaning. People think of it as forcing yourself to feel bad about yourself when you feel nothing of the sort. But the Greek word suggests it is about rethinking our lives and re-orientating them. For Jesus this was a re-orientation to what he called the kingdom of God, inviting people to be the kind of people who would be at home in it. At the least, in a secular context, it means asking questions about what we live by and rethinking our lives towards what, in our best moments, we want to be.