Mountaineer, Friend, Partner, Youth Worker, Spiritual Adventurer of No Fixed Abode.
Friday, April 28, 2006
Alt Worship Ideas Workshop... and for once it's not middle class!
My good friend Charity is 'Fresh Expressions' worker for Bristol Methodist Circuit.
This means she gets to explore loads of stuff around how to do emerging church and fresh organic authentic expressions of worship... but rather than for the brain focussed, abstract, accademic and middle class clientel that emergent and alt worship generally pick up in their, in a really nitty gritty, down to earth, working class, non pretentious environment of a deprived multi-cultural area of Bristol. I think this is fab!
She is running a Fresh Expression Training Dayon Sat 7th May 2006. Cost is £3.00 - not bad eh? I wish I was going but am working that afternoon in Plymouth!
When I talk about the Kingdom of God, and say that I have hopes at some point for a world order of justice, peace, inclusion and love, I've been called all sorts of things, from a hippy, to a liberal, to a ridiculous optimist and told it will never happen.
A conversation with a tutor at college threw a new light on the Easter story from this point of view. Jesus, the perfect human who exemplified the Kingdom of God was crucified by imperfect humans who couldn't care less. They killed the ideal of perfect humanity... however he didn't stay dead! And for me that is a story of great hope, that the ideal of a just world, a world order of Shalom, even though it is trampled and seems to be hopelessly dead will not stay dead! Perhaps if Christians everywhere started to focus on life in this world before death, rather than getting through life as quickly as possible to get to some abstract life after death, there would be even more hope!
The BBC News site today has an artical about Social Entrepreneurship. A trend amoung young bussiness students to want to use their bussiness skills to tackle some of the problems faced by the world, rather than capitalising on a huge profit. If this is a trend amoungst the younger generation of students, then maybe the hope for the future shared by some Christians is a little more than ridiculous optimism.
I used to see myself as a shy person. I had lot of energy, and a lot to say, but tended to keep it hidden through fear or lack of confidence. I think this is different though, for me there was a bouncy, loud, mouthy, not shy individual waiting to bounce out. I really value people who are quieter though. I have some wonderful friends who it takes a little longer to get to know as they are quieter with who they are, you have to really want to get to know them to do so. And I think that is a beautiful thing, and we don't do them justice by saying that shyness is always something to be overcome. In Nouwen's book The Wounded Healer, he talks about making space in our homes and in our lives for those we care for a listen to, and to do this there must be a withdrawal of ourself. I like this, and as a non shy extrovery bouncy loud person it's something I need to work on.
In todays news are reports of a new multi-agency unit set up specifically to target internet paedophiles.
I'm glad this is being done, and I think a multi-agency unit has to be a good thing.
I like that they're considering empowering children to report those they are suspicious of by copying and pasting the conversation they're having into the CEOP.
However, I'm a little uncomfortable that they're going to do some of their work by posing as children on the web to attract paedophiles to them. I don't know why I'm uncomfortable. Maybe it's just a good undercover technique... but posing as a child in a children's chat room doesn't seem entirely right.
And I also wonder if they'd have done better to keep quiet about it- kept it as undercover- or are they imagining that all paedophiles are stupid?
I'd be interested to know what other people's gut reactions are, as well as thought through reactions.
What is it about the smell of the sea? What is it about the cry of the gulls? What is it about walking with someone you love? What is it about the first warm day in spring? What is it about the sound of the waves? What is it about the rugged coastline?
On Saturday we visited Mevagissey. Something in the air awoke me spiritually. It pushed me to an aching and a longing for more. A longing to be by the sea, but more than to be by the sea, a longing to remember who I am, where I have come from, what I love. I longing to touch and know that which is greater than me, A longing for God, for spiritual connection.
If spiritual connection and awakening is as simple as spending a day on the coast, how can we suggest that as Christians we have the monopoly on spiritual experience?
If nothing else it's nice to have nice weather at Easter and some holiday time.
The National Marine Aquarium is fab, although a bit crowded in the holdiays, the fish are amazing, especially the great big green eel type thing in the coral tank. I learned that starfish have no brains, and enjoyed mini sub racing, although Sandee beat me coz Little Ben was a bit too hard to handle!
And we made Chocolate Cornflake Easter nests and learned that I like cadburies mini eggs better than smarties ones. Maybe Easter isn't such a spiritual write off after all if we get to have amazing days out- after all having a nice day out, looking at fascinating life forms, and enjoying a day with someone you love can be as deeply spiritual an experience as you're ever likely to get in a church.
Has anyone else noticed a patten to the blog breaks? Yup- when assignments are coming up I tend to focus them and not much else! I don't think I did the last one much justice but hey! Although... I had a nightmare last night that I only got a 40 for it.... oh no that sounded like Hermione Granger!
But I'm tired!
I'm tired of only skim reading books so that I can take to peices and draw from ideas before I fully digest them. I'm tired of my writing and thinking having to constantly jump through hoops.
I need some time and space for myself. To read for myself, to browse the shelves of a library and let the books that are asking similar questions to the ones I'm asking jump out at me, rather than having to skip through them and reject those who don't have anything relevant to the latest assignment.
I need to know why I am a Christian. Why is Easter such a big deal when I've rejected the ideas of penal substitution and of an angry God? What is unique about Jesus who I love and follow? Why did Jesus have to die? Why Why Why.
Sometimes I think I'm finding the answers to these questions... and sometimes I feel totally cut lose in terms of my thinking and of where I fit in theologically and spiritually.
My prayer this Easter, is for my faith and believe to find a newness of life. I pray that for all those who are in a similar place and asking similar questions.
