Rev David Lunan took up office as the new moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland last Thursday.

He announced that the two major themes for his year as spiritual representative of the Kirk would be "prayer and money" in light of widespread economic injustice.

"We live in a money culture - almost every decision is taken on the basis of money," Rev Lunan, 63, was quoted by the BBC as saying.

"It undermines all the other values that not only we in the Church, but the whole of society should be addressing.

"Having developed an interest in what's happening in poorer countries throughout the world, you realise that money's at the heart of the problem there.

"We in the west have decided the terms of trade which ensure that half the world starves - this cannot be right."

Prior to his role as moderator, the London-born Rev Lunan was the clerk to the presbytery of Glasgow. He was ordained in 1970.

He succeeds the Rev Sheilagh Kesting, who was the first female minister to become a moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland.