Crossing the bar

The Lake of Galilee

2012-01-27T10:27:00.002Z

There are times when by the lake, you stop; no noise, no words, no nothing, just silence and peace. No rush, just stillness. And at that time, understand and reflect on this new way, this touch of love. Rush and you miss it; speak and you won't hear it. Love just waits for your response.

Further Reflections

2012-01-27T10:22:00.002Z

Viewing and visiting the sites of Jerusalem I ponder that some add layers to protect the sacred while others seek to remove these layers in order to find the sacred, including the layers of religiosity.
...to be in-step with God or with religion, for one I must choose and with one be -out-of-step...

Reflections on Jerusalem

2012-01-27T09:52:00.006Z

How strange that as I look over all the temples, churches, shrines and sites of man-achievement laying claim to God, to their version of God, to their God, fighting to lay claim to God and their religious heritage that it is actually God who is the one that fights for and over us and lays claim to us.
How strange that we compete against each other for His attention (with bells, calls to prayer and so on) when it is He who competes to get our attention and therefore has to compete with our distractions of bells and calls to prayer and so on.
In many ways Jerusalem is like a snow-globe, a microcosm of humanity; its passions and possessions, its fervour and ferocity. A city built on religious fault-lines; religion, identity and politics that can erupt into devastating destruction at any moment. Dividing walls separating communities and families, each claiming possession and heritage. All symbols of the best and worst of humanity. To pray for the peace of Jerusalem is not only about the literal city but also about the microcosm of humanity that it represents.

Clergy vs Laity

2011-06-10T09:17:00.002+01:00

The Abolition of the Laity by R. Paul Stevens
'...in the 2nd and 3rd centutries a definite clergy-lay distinction arose largely from three influences: (1) imitation of the secular structures of the Greek-Roman world not unlike the professional-lay distinction in the modern world; (2) the transference of the Old Testament priesthood model to the leadership of the church; (3) popular piety which elevated the Lord's Supper to a MYSTERY which required priestly administration' (p39)

VS

Priests in a People's Church by George Guiver et al
'When Christian ministers lead us in the Eucharist, they are leading us into MYSTERY...' (p29)

Paul Tillich

2011-03-04T12:07:00.003Z

'ectasy of being grasped unconditionally' (1948, p81)
Faith is not technological realism, where in order to discover the really real, it is objectified into something that can be measured and expressed in human reason
NOR
is faith mystical realism, where in order to discover the really real, one has to escape the 'now' seeking 'the inner power of things beyond, essence and intuition
BUT
rather faith is historical realism, where the really real is asked for in time and space.
And when the unconditional reveals and transforms the conditional, a state of ectasy or faith occurs as it is grasped by the unconditional, as it is contemporeous to the 'here and now'.
True ectasy is united with faith, and faith transcends what seems to be real, because it is in the presence of the really, the ultimately, real (p80).
The man today who feels separated by a gulf from the theistic believer, often knows more about the 'ultimate' than the self-assured Christian who thinks that through his faith he has God in his possession, at least intellectually (p82).

Lord save us from your followers

2011-01-14T14:27:00.001Z

Watch this trailer: click here

The alchemist

2011-01-11T20:40:00.002Z

It's not love to be static like the desert, nor is it love to roam the world like the wind. And it's not love to see everything from a distance, like you do (the sun). Love is the force that transforms and improves the Soul of the World...when we love, we always strive to become better than we are...

The boy turned to the hand that wrote all. As he did so, he sensed that the universe had fallen silent, and he decided not to speak. A current of love rushed from his heart and the boy began to pray. It was a prayer that he had never said before, because it was a prayer without words or pleas. His prayer didn't give thanks for his sheep having found new pastures; it didn't ask that the boy be able to sell more crystal; and it didn't beseech that the women he had met continue to await his return. In the silence, the boy understood that the desert, the wind, and the sun were also trying to understand the signs written by the hand, and were seeking to follow their paths, and to understand what had been written on a single emerald.

The ultimate religious sacrifice is to give up God

2010-12-09T10:57:00.001Z

click here

come on, it is good!

2010-12-09T10:26:00.001Z

click here

Worth the listen

2010-12-09T10:19:00.001Z

Open the mp3 clip. It is a rather long clip but profoundly challenging...take the time to lisen
- what needs to change?
- how?
click here

The main thing, is the main thing

2010-12-09T10:17:00.001Z

The main bit is at 2:10 to 2:46 in the clip.....listen carefully
- what is the main emphasis in our faith expression?
- what is the priority?
- how can we move others towards such an ideal?
click here

think forward

2010-12-09T10:16:00.002Z

What we believe emanates from who we are. And who we are is not about dogma, or even about moral behavior, but about dying to ourselves. This is part of the conversation between ThinkFwd host, Spencer Burke, and Pete Rollins, author of How Not to Speak of God and The Orthodox Heretic. They explore the ideas of truth and God, of resurrection and insurrection.Truth, says Rollins, is not one extreme or the other; its not the middle of the extremes. Truth is at both extremes. While traditional Christians say, God is present. God exists, and Christianity is true; atheists say God isnt there and Christianity isnt true. These two extremes push Rollins to explore a 3rd position and he likens it to the story of Jesus on the cross, when He felt forsaken by God-- God not present--and yet God was completely present. And so the 3rd position dwells in the very place in between. Rollins says Christians are called to dwell not on one side of the other, but in the very split that Christ opens up: between old and new; between Judaism and Christianity.
- do you live in the tension that is the split?
- how can we live more in balance?
- how can we bring movement towards balance in our faith expressions?

Jay Bakker

2010-12-09T10:11:00.003Z

I am moved by the emotion in this clip click here

Brian Mclaren answers the million dollar question

2010-07-12T11:52:00.001+01:00

http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/onfaith/panelists/brian_d_mclaren/2010/07/let_there_be_peace_in_our_individual_identities.html

History

2010-06-14T09:59:00.002+01:00

Reading the minutes of the primitive methodists from 1860-1882, it is facinating to note that Good Friday was a good day for fund raising (rather than celebration), Easter and Christmas were acceptable times for leave for ministers and that a Christmas day service was NOT the norm. We forget that as protestants, Christmas (Christ Mass - a Catholic celebration) and Easter were 'events' related to the Catholic faith they were protesting against and therefore did not observe. And yet today it is these very protestants who kick up a fuss when secular cities do not want to call things Easter or Christmas when 200 years ago those same protestants would agree. How history changes and how quick we forget.
Thanks to Michael Hickman for the information on the minutes

Barque: Thomas Moore's Work: Give up thought patterns for heaven on earth

2010-05-27T10:31:00.001+01:00

Barque: Thomas Moore's Work: Give up thought patterns for heaven on earth

Tony Campolo

2010-05-27T09:32:00.002+01:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m584z5aE4Uc
The main bit is at 2:10 to 2:46 in the clip.....listen carefully

I can not deny how I got it wrong so many times when the priorty was not Matthew 25 but rather my own self righteous judgement (insecurities). The priority is love in action...and to that end I strive.

Compassion

2010-05-27T09:28:00.002+01:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s30ZKjNfRlU
I have met too many people hurt, rejected, struggling and broken who do not fit the stereo-type the conservative church would have you believe but people with tears in their eyes shattered by the words spoken in judgement. I heard a good friend say once, 'God aint gonna judge you for being too kind and compassionate...rather for not being enough'

Brian McLaren, A New Kind of Christianity

2010-05-27T09:19:00.004+01:00

'I am a Christian who no longer believes in Christianity'

This is an extremely provocative statement that Brian is making but I agree and understand what he is saying. For quite some time now I have been in conflict due to my own personal experience of God compared to my experience of institutional church. The two seems poles apart. What I have experienced is cold judgement, arrogance, elitism and many other negative gospel-denying characteristics. Too many, too many times to keep ignoring and excusing.

In fact, I would possible even take it another step further and not even label myself Christian anymore because when that label was given to believers in Antioch it was defining a completely different person compared to today what is understood by Christian.

Many may find security in the label, finding the label acting as a pillar which if removed will jeopardise the remaining structure. In my journey 'away from here' I have found that vulnerability extremely uncomfortable and exposing but as I begin to slowly identify new arrival points, the vulnerability has been worth it. See my next post as to some of those arrival points. Thank you for listening.

Thomas Moore

2009-11-18T21:51:00.002Z

There are two ways to be spiritually secure: one is to attach to a fixed and uncomplicated teaching, leadership, and set of moral standards. Another is to be open to life, ever deepening your understanding and giving up all defensiveness around convictions. The first way offers only the illusion of certainty, an illusion that must be maintained by anxious inflexibility. The second is to live from a deeper source, with values that cannot be codified in a list of rules. Central among these values is love, understood as profound respect for others.
Writing in the sand, p.xvi

I am drawn and challenged by these words because as I stand aloof as an on-looker at my own faith, the tradition I am a part of, I see these two tensions exist in futile revelry. Not only do I straddle both these opposing worldviews and philosophies in my working context, I have also colluded with both like a harlot, guilty myself of the illusion it evoked until my reality and the 'shit that happens' rocked me into the reality of failure and rejection. And at that point of isolated vulnerability, it is the latter that has been the most accepting, restorative and the most honest option for me to pursue as a new deeper experience.

Performance and Auntenticity

2009-09-14T17:24:00.003+01:00

Christian ministry somehow failed to professionalize:
the clergyman is a jack of all trades...there is nothing which he does that could not be done equally well by a lawyer or bricklayer in the congregation...He does not have a job at all in any sense which is readily understandable today, and today, more than ever before, a person must have a job in order to fit into society...p87

Performing priesthood made him less authentic rather than more: instead of finding unity in a variety of roles, he had come to believe that he was acting rather than being true to himself ...p88

Redefining Christian Britain

In a module on inter-professionalism the above statement hit me like a ton of bricks. My hidden status and profession as a minister, I suggested clergy could be part of this inter-professional discussion. Laughter burst forth as if I was the new comedian on the block. Have we 'de-professionalised' ourselves? Has society? Have we just been left behind, asleep?

I do feel we still have much to offer, some more so than others, but the challenge lay mockingly on the table...can we again be a part of society in a way that contributes and that is valued by society?

The gauntlet perhaps is more personal and boils down to authenticity?

Colin Morris

2009-06-03T15:27:00.001+01:00

Perhaps Christianity became a problem solving religion when, instead of it converting Europe as is widely supposed, European culture converted Christianity from being a near-eastern apocalyptic faith into a western problem solving ideology to be harnessed to the needs of an optimistic and thrusting scientific civilization. p61 start your own religion

john shelby spong

2009-04-27T10:36:00.003+01:00

Look at him! Look not at his divinity, but look, rather, at his freedom.
Look not at the exaggerated tales of his of his power, but look, rather at his infinite capacity to give himself away.
Look not at the first-century mythology that surrounds him, but look, rather, at his courage to be, his ability to live, the contagious quality of his love.

p16...in grief situations that i have entered as a pastor, it is inevitably the religious person who is insensitive, who feels compelled to speak surface assurances, who suppresses real feelings with homilies on faith, and who readily supplies pat answers for diffecult and complex questions.

p54...i am glad the realm of spiritual is no more. i am glad that the god identified with this realm is dead. we isolated the god of our religion in a system and located it in an otherworldly ghetto. Now the secular world has killed that god...but a god who could be isolated from the world could certainly not be either the god of the hebrews or the god of the bible. so perhaps the death of that god is only the death of an idol who masqueraded as god for almost 2000 years...for the first time since christianity escaped its jewish origins, we again perceive reality as a whole.

p164...orthodoxy will have no power unless honest heresy is a possibility.

Browning quoted by Drane

2008-11-21T17:31:00.003Z

Most of us stand on the boundary: religious communities attract us; we may even participate in them; but we also wonder if they make sense.
The McDonaldization of the church

i-revtrev

2008-11-15T17:50:00.002Z

Exert from new book:
I like to think that one day out side time and space (I know, that is a paradox!) there existed (another paradox because to exist assumes time) this ‘being’ called Love. This Love was not some ungraspable phenomenon like the wind but had a personality and other personable qualities and in its nature being love, seeking to love, Love decided to create a life that would be able to share in this life force of love but also be objects of love, experiencing and being loved by Love. However, understanding the complexities of this mystery love (and truly who today still understands love), Love gave Love a name…God and so we have: God is Love.

Desperate housewives does church

2008-10-26T22:02:00.001Z

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=xyVEEHidhGE&feature=related

Ronald Cole Turner

2008-09-29T13:58:00.002+01:00

It is altogether likely that the church will marginalize itself in the role of chaplain, picking up the peices, caring for the bruised, mopping up the damaged, but never engaging the engines of transformation themselves, steering, persuading, and transforming the tranformers.

Richard Holloway

2008-07-25T16:24:00.002+01:00

He understands the necessity of law and its origin in our fear of the chaos of our own undisciplined passions; but he also recognises that the law itself can only shakkle, never transform the passions; and it is the transformed heart that is his ambition because it alone can chnage the world ... doubts and love p194

Rumi

2008-05-19T16:06:00.001+01:00

Come come whoever you are
Wanderer, worshipper, lover of leaving,
It does not matter
Ours is not a caravan of despair
Even if you have broken your vows
A thousand times it does not matter
Come, yet again, come

John Caputo

2008-03-26T14:22:00.002Z

But what then is the kingdom of God? Where is it found? It is found every time an offense is forgiven, every time a stranger is made welcome, every time an enemy is embraced, every time the least among us is lifted up, every time the law is made to serve justice, everytime a prophetic voice is raised against injustice, every time the law and the prophets are summed up by love.
p138...what would jesus deconstruct

Nude Christianity

2008-02-13T15:32:00.001Z

http://www.emergingchurch.info/stories/nudes/index.htm

Rev Adam Sapple waves at me from across the sand dunes. "We’re over here mate!" he shouts, his Australian accent strangely at odds with this quiet Welsh beach. As I round the corner I see Adam and his team preparing for a days witness. He is wearing a traditional dog collar, pair of sports sandals and nothing else. Welcome to ‘Naturists Unashamedly Doing Evangelism and Surfing’ (NUDES) - the UK’s first naturist beach mission.
NUDES started their work in the area two years ago when Adam moved from his native Sydney to Wales after meeting NUDES co-founder Eve Ennsong at a clothes-free worship weekend in Norway. They discovered they both came from a background of surfing and Adam’s tales of his ‘Naked Surfers for Peace’ crusade down-under reminded her of a similar group she had contact with in her native Newquay. They decided that they absolutely had to take it to the next level and start a beach mission that combined their love of clothes-free watersports with their passion for spreading good news.
Finding the perfect location for this involved a summer travelling the UK’s surf spots and nudist beaches in a battered VW camper. "Obviously it was going to be a compromise", says Adam whose sun-bleached hair and deep tan is still more Bondi Beach than Barmouth, "We needed an officially sanctioned clothes free bathing area and some decent waves. Eventually we arrived here and found it to be perfect - it‘s paradise to us." ‘Here’ is Wyndup Beach in Cardigan Bay, Wales.
Since then the liberated duo have recruited people of a similar mind to help with the weekend beach mission. A typical Saturday in the summer months will see them set up in the centre of the naturist area with an array of irreverent banners such as ‘bare your bum and save your soul’ and ‘shed your clothes and sins’. Unfortunately the last ‘s’ of that sentence has peeled off the banner and as we chat is causing some inappropriate interest from a group of tourists. "Never mind," grins Adam, "it’s another great witness opportunity."
"Nakedness is crucial to what we’re about,’" explains Eve as she wedges a boogie-board into the sand as a makeshift pulpit, "once people get beyond the pretence of fashion and image they find that can be totally open with each other. It’s led to some revealing conversations." She’s also quick to point out that NUDES isn’t just about preaching and converts: "We’re very much part of the local naturist community. Our barbeques are a highlight of the week for many bathers down here, not just those involved with the mission." I later hear talk of an unfortunate incident at a previous barbeque although the naturist involved has returned to Wyndup and the beach mission after only needing minor medical treatment.
The NUDES team are largely in their 30s and 40s, many coming from a surfing or naturist background for whom church activities were something of a guilty secret. Here they gather unashamed under the group’s logo - a surfer with a halo. One recent convert breaks the pattern though - Sir Pentonville-Hastings is a retired General who caught the nudist bug whilst serving with the Highland Regiment in Borneo. He arrives just as Adam suggests the surf is high enough to start the days sport. Some of the team help with the large box the retired General is carrying - full of home grown fruit from his estate. The local newspaper’s lead story today is that the Ministry of Agriculture have warned locals to not eat any local produce after a potentially dangerous chemical cloud passed over the region last week. But ‘Sir Pent’, as he’s affectionately referred to, is having none of it and encourages Eve to hand round the delicious looking fruit.
Meanwhile Adam is running headlong into some impressive waves singing hymns at the top of his voice. As I discard my t-shirt and shorts to join in the collecting of driftwood for ‘the barbie’ I reflect that perhaps this is pretty close to paradise after all.

Just Perfect

2008-02-13T13:57:00.002Z

Edwin Markham

2007-12-14T10:25:00.000Z

They drew a circle that shut me out
Heretic, rebel, a thing to flout
But love and I had the wit to win
We drew a circle that took them in

leadership

2007-12-14T10:20:00.000Z

Whats makes the temptation to power so seemingly irresistible? Maybe it is that power offers an easy substitute for the hard task of love. It seems easier to be God than to love God, easier to own life than to love life....The temptation of power is greatest when intamacy is a threat
Nouwen quoted in Reviewing Leadership by Banks and Ledbetter

Symbols of divine presence

2007-11-02T14:19:00.000Z

we should probably look for existential rather than conceptual criteria....life may be recognised to be larger than logic; love may take precedence over truth; the neighbour as a person may become more important than his belief. reflection on the work of the Spirit may be subordinated to a readiness to be led by the Spirit together with partners into the depth of God's mystery
Amos Yong

Tainted rose

2007-09-04T16:45:00.000+01:00

Prayer

2007-08-23T09:02:00.001+01:00

I hate it when all you can do is pray. I don’t understand prayer very well, and around here it often feels like a waste of time. I know that’s wrong, or at least wrong to say, so you don’t have to write back to me about it. Better that you should pray for me, eh?
Bart Campolo
http://thewalnuthillsfellowship.org/?page_id=16

Next time you pray or you are in a room with people praying, do yourself a favour and listen to what is being said, especially about God and then ask yourself, what we are saying, praying, what does that reveal about what we believe about God. As an example, 'God I just ask that you would touch hearts and minds here tonight'. Now what does that say about God? Does he not automatically touch hearts and minds? Does he not act unless we ask him (he is not sovereign)? He needs our wisdom as what to do? That we desire for people to know Him more than He does that is why we need to ask?

As far as I know and experience, the only reason I know God and desire for others to know Him, is because He has taken the initiative in encountering me. If anything I need His help to make me more aware of where and when He is touching hearts and minds so I can cooperate with Him.

CS Lewis in the movie Shadowlands says to a colleague who is angry with him for quitting his lecture post in remorse for his lost wife to take time to pray, accusing CS Lewis that prayer will not change her death and bring her back to life, Lewis says, 'I pray not because it changes God, but because it changes me'.

How I long for a more God-centered Theology and less a man-centered humanism.

Verse

2007-08-23T09:01:00.000+01:00

'i thought i had to change the world for you to notice me'
evanesence

Conclusion

2007-08-06T10:06:00.001+01:00

Of those who cannot or will not isolate themselves, some will leave the church as it is and return later to the same church as they are. But I consider it highly likely that a large number of people who grow up in our modern churches - evangelical or liberal, Protestant or Catholic - will leave and never return - at least, not to our churches as they are.
McClaren, Stories of Emergence

David is asked by his brothers, 'why are you here? Have you come to watch us die?' Brothers who question the motive of a younger brother, left out of the ranks, anointed in front of them as the next choice! How many David's are being left on the side-lines because they don't look like they know what they doing, like they won't know what they doing? How many emerging leaders will remain just that, emerging!?

Even the King doubts his ability and questions whether he can succeed at the task. The church in the West is in a crisis. Decline has been the constant diet for two decades now but where are the David's? The Kings of denominations don't believe the David's of this generation can and have the ability to make a significant change.

The King finally agrees but gives David the blue print of how he will do it. We will employ a post-modern generation to make the changes we think should be made. Oh they can do the job, but with our resources and methods.

Tick-tock the time is running out.

Tinkering and window dressing aint gonna make the thing work. It is broken and it aint gonna get fixed. 'We need new forms of evangelism', but maybe its just that ethos that got ya in this mess in the first place! 'We need new forms of church that will appeal to a new generation', so that they too can just re-gergetate the same indigestion consumer orientated fast food dead religious crap?

Meaningless, meaningless, all is meaningless

2007-08-03T11:23:00.001+01:00

Like the generation who heard their own pain in the larynx-ripping squall of his grunge sound, Kurt Cobain seemed to be someone who could empathize with them in their purposelessness, weakness, confusion, worthlessness and shame. That is exactly what Jesus came to do, to sympathize with us in our weakness. Exactly a year after his death, four fans from Toronto drove all the way to Seattle to hang themselves as a tribute to their hero. That Friday one year later just happened to be Good Friday.

(Steve Stockman, The Rock Cries Out)

Authentic and real

2007-06-25T17:05:00.002+01:00

While many Christian leaders are constantly working out their faiths (and their theologies, their politics and their personal ministries) with fear and trembling in private, very few feel free to do so out in the open, where all kinds of other people can watch us wrestle with our ideas. So then, when somebody like me puts his immediate, unpolished stuff out there for all the world to see, well, it is bound to make at least some people awfully uncomfortable, and others downright angry. An extract from Bart Campolo (http://www.bartcampolo.com/blog/?p=150)

Why do we so arrogantly claim to know that which will cause others to stumble in hurt and disappointment? I have too many times deeply hurt others because I thought I knew better. I did not and as time revealed the rust and rot that gathered on my views of ignorance and pride, friendships and relationships, people with hearts and emotions lay poisons from the scars of my blows.

I salute you for being willing to risk and explore, ventured by love and festered by compassion. Not surrendering to the naive action of surrounding yourself only with and by that which agrees and gives security, I salute your bravery to vulnerability as you in broken love seep the wounds of broken dreams and promises.

Pete Rollins

2007-06-07T16:21:00.001+01:00

http://www.emergingchurch.info/stories/cafe/peterollins/index.htm

Like most in my generation, I start to sweat a little when people ask me what I place at the top of a certain hierarchy, having that sinking feeling that I am always on the move means that what I say today may be different from what I say tomorrow, as it was different than what I said yesterday. Questions about the best film I have seen the greatest book I have read or the most inspiring music I have listened to all bring me to a stuttering silence
But so as not to avoid the question entirely, I guess recently I have valued the space Ikon has given me to learn. Not long ago we started up the Ikon evangelism project - I can hear the gasp - but this project is not about evangelising others but rather about being evangelised! We would visist groups such as the Russian Orthodox, the Quakers, the Muslims, the Jewish community etc. in order to listen, learn and be transformed. We also watched the 'Last Temptation of Christ' together and read Nietzsche's brilliant book The Antichrist.

There was once a small town filled with believers who sought to act always in obedience to the voice of God. When faced with difficult situations the leaders of the community would often be found deep in prayer, or searching the scriptures, for guidance and wisdom. Late one evening, in the middle of winter, a young man from the neighboring city arrived at the gates of the town's little church seeking refuge. The caretaker immediately let him in and, seeing that he was hungry and cold, provided a meal and some warm clothes. After he had eaten the young man explained how he had fled the city because the authorities had labeled him a political dissident. It turned out that the man had been critical of both the Government and the Church in his work as a journalist. The caretaker brought the young man back to his home and allowed him to stay until a plan had been worked out concerning what to do next.When the Priest was informed of what had happened he called the leaders of the town together in order to work out what ought to be done. After two days of discussion it was agreed that the man should be handed over the the authorities in order to face up to the crimes he had committed. But the caretaker protested, saying, 'this man has committed no crimes, he has merely criticised what he believes to be the injustices perpetrated by authorities in the name of God''What you say may be true', replied the Priest, 'but his presence puts the whole of this town in danger, for what if the authorities work out where he is and learn that we protected him'.But the caretaker refused to hand him over to the Priest, saying, 'he is my guest and while under my roof I will ensure that no harm comes to him. If you take him from me by force then I will publicly attest to having helped him and suffer the same injustice as my guest'.The caretaker was well loved by the people and the Priest had no intention of letting something happen to him. So the Leaders went away again and this time searched the scriptures for an answer for they knew that the caretaker was a man of deep faith. After a whole night of pouring over the scriptures the leaders came back to the caretaker saying,'We have read the sacred book all through the night seeking guidance and found that it tells us that we must respect the authorities of this land and witness to the truth of faith through submission to them'. But the caretaker also knew the sacred words of scripture and told them that the bible also asked that we care for those who suffer and are persecuted.There and then the leaders began to pray fervently. They beseeched God to speak to them, not as a still small voice in their conscience, but rather in the way that He had spoken to Abraham and Moses. They begged that God would communicate directly to them and to the caretaker so that the issue could finally be resolved. Sure enough the sky began to darken and God descended from heaven, saying,'The Priest and Elders speak the truth my friend. In order to protect the town this man must be handed over to the authorities'.But the caretaker, a man of deep faith, looked up to heaven and replied, 'if you want me to remain faithful to you my God then I can do nothing but refuse your advice. For I do not need the scriptures or your words to tell me what I ought to do. You have already demanded that I look after this man. You have written that I must protect him at all costs. Your words of love have been spelt out by the lines of this mans face, your text is found in the texture of his flesh. And so my God, I defy you precisely so as to remain faithful to you'.With this God withdrew, knowing that the matter had finally been settled.
http://www.ignite.cd/blogs/Pete/index.cfm

His Confidence - WB Yeats

2007-03-30T15:20:00.000+01:00

Undying love to buy
I wrote upon
The corners of this eye
All wrongs done.
What payment were enough
For dying love?

I broke my heart in two
So hard I struck.
What matter? For I know
That out of rock,
Out of a desolate source,
Love leaps upon its course.

Leonard Sweet

2007-03-21T15:20:00.000Z

Creation was a speech event. Creation was sounded forth, literally. Sound became sight. Cosmic vibrations became galactic visions. The cosmos began with a Sound.
When the Bible says God "rested" on the Sabbath day, it doesn't mean God got tired and took a break. It simply means that God entered those spaces and silences without which there would be no music. In the monastic tradition, the lectio divina was read out loud because as one heard the text and felt its vibrations, the monks believed that the words would sound in the depths of one's being, and the Bible's black letters would dance in the soul.
Scientists are still picking up those soundings. In fact, according to the most recent scientific findings it is sound waves that have shaped how the cosmos is structured. Let me quote this exactly so that you don't think I'm making something up: "Sound waves generated in the early universe may have helped orchestrate the striking pattern of galaxy clusters and huge voides seen in the sky today."
Mathematician/astronomer Johannes Kepler (1571-1630) produced his final masterpiece in 1619 entitled The Harmonies of the World in which the universe is presented as a symphony of sound. The five visible planets and the moon with their elliptical orbits constitute a six-part harmony motet,37 while the outer three planets (Uranus, Neptune and Pluto had not been discovered yet) add the "rhythm section" in which Pluto beats the bass drum. Two researchers from Yale University -- Willie Ruff and John Rodgers -- put the "songs of the planets" into a synthesizer and made a recording of it (The Harmony of the World). David Deamer has composed a musical translation of DNA sequences he calls DNA Music.
The cosmos is more than some random vibrational matrix. From the innumerable vibrations the cosmos could choose, it only chooses those vibrations that make "harmonic sense" and ultimately "musical sense." The electron shell of the carbon atom, physicists tell us, follows the laws of harmonics. As Joachim-Ernst Berendt first pointed out, the tone scale C through A is the hexachord of Gregorian chant. Could it be that all carbon based life is actually built on the Gregorian chant? It is more than a metaphor to say that every atom sings a song. The very nuclie of all atoms make music.
Wind sweeps through the trees like a violin's bow,Rustling the leaves in boughs bended low.Steady, the ribbitting rhythm of frogsEchoes its temp through hollowed-out logs.The many-voiced brook as it babbles alongIs ever creating new words to the song.All Nature resounds the divine symphony,And upon the great stage, the dancer is me!
When in our Music
God is Glorified and adoration leaves no room for pride,
it is as though the whole creation cried Alleluia.
How often, making music, we have found a new dimension in the world of sound,
as worship moved us to a more profound Alleluia.
So has the church in liturgy and song,
in faith and love, through centuries of wrong,
borne witness to the truth in every tongue, Alleluia.
And did not Jesus sing a psalm that night when utmost evil strove against the light?
Then let us sing, for whom he won the fight: Alleluia.
Let every instrument be tuned for praise!
Let all rejoice who have a voice to raise!
And may God give us faith to sing always Alleluia.
http://www.leonardsweet.com/sweetened/Editions/3-7-8-9/part3.htm

To life

2007-03-21T15:10:00.000Z

L'chaim

Martin Buber

2007-03-21T15:03:00.000Z

Enoch was a cobbler, and with every stitch of his awl that drew together the top and bottom of the leather, he joined God and the Shekinah...Man exerts influence on the eternal, and this not done by any special works, but by the intention with which he does all his works. This is the teaching of the hallowing of the veryday. The issue is not to attain to a new type of acting which, owing to its object, would be sacred or mystical; the issue is to do the one appointed task, the common, obvious tasks of daily life, according to their truth and according to their meaning.

Bernard of Clairvaux

2007-03-21T14:58:00.000Z

There are those who seek knowledge for the sake of knowledge:
That is curiosity.
There are those who seek knowledge to be known by others;
That is vanity.
There are those who seek knowledge in order to serve;
That is love.

2007-02-27T19:10:00.000Z

Duke Special, Duke of York's, Brighton
By Nicole Greatrex
Any music coming your way via Phil Nelson is guaranteed to be unique, extraordinary and a little eclectic.
Having led The Levellers and Aqualung to fame, the Brighton manager has recently taken a risk with brilliantly discordant band The Fallout Trust and now reveals his latest signing, Duke Special.
Wearing a brass-buttoned suit jacket and his hair in dreadlocks, The Duke - real name Peter Wilson - stood hunched over his piano for most of the set, crashing down on the keys in time to the beat of a huge bass drum.
With a clear yet strongly Irish-accented voice, he produced lushly romantic and ambitious sounds peppered with instrumental improvisations and Twenties-style music hall influences.
The mixture of both lighthearted and melancholic tracks from his album, Songs From the Deep Forest, included the beautiful duet, This Could Be My Last Day, and former single Last Night I Nearly Died. But the real highlight was current single Freewheel.
As the Duke balanced precariously on his stool and hit the piano so hard it budged across the stage, the song built to a heart-breaking climax of passionate vocals, crashing cymbals and violin flurries.
It was a performance strong and moving enough to show that manager Nelson has, unbelievably, struck gold yet again.

Christmas Cheer

2006-12-21T15:22:00.000Z

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pv5zWaTEVkI

From Jason

2006-11-22T12:21:00.000Z

There is an ancient story, passed down through the generations that tells of a group of unknown disciples who witnessed the bloody crucifixion of Christ.
Not able to stay another moment in the place were their Messiah had just been crucified they packed their few belongings and left for a distant shore. With great sorrow they turned their back on the place of their birth, never to return. Instead they founded an isolated community far away from Jerusalem. On the first night that they set up camp each disciple vowed to keep the ground holy, they promised that as long as they were permitted to live they would keep the memory of Christ alive and endeavour to follow the way that he had once taught.
The community lived in great solitude for over a hundred years, spending their days reflecting upon the life of Jesus and attempting to remain faithful to his ways. All this despite the overwhelming sorrow in their hearts and the harrowing sacrifices that such a dedicated life required.
Endless days passed until at dawn one morning, a small band of missionaries stumbled upon the isolated settlement. These preachers of the Word where amazed by the community that they found, they were startled by the fact that these dedicated disciple’s of Christ had no knowledge of his resurrection and ascension. Without hesitation the missionaries gathered together the entire community and taught them about the events that had transpired after the horrific crucifixion of their Lord, telling them of His victory over sin and death and the subsequent rewards we can partake of because of this.
That evening there was a great celebration in the camp. Yet, as the night grew dark, one of the younger missionaries noticed that the leader of the community was absent. This bothered the young man and so he set out to look for the elder. After some time he eventually found the leader kneeling in the corner of a small hut, on the fringe of the village, praying and weeping.
”Why are you in such sorrow”, asked the missionary in amazement “for now is the hour for great celebration”.
”Indeed” replied the elder, who was all the while crouched on the floor, ‘this is an hour for rejoicing, but it is also a time for great sorrow”.
“For over a hundred years we have followed the ways taught to us by Christ. We emulated his teachings faithfully even though it cost us deeply, and we remained resolute despite the belief that death had defeated Him and would one day defeat us also”.
The elder slowly got to his feet and looked the missionary compassionately in the face.
”Each day we have forsaken our very lives for Him. Why? Because we judge Him wholly worthy of the sacrifice, wholly worthy of our being. You find me now, praying for myself and for my future generations, for I am fearful that we may one day follow him not because we love Him and believe him to be worthy of that love, but rather because we love ourselves and want the treasures of eternal life that he offers”.
After offering these thoughts to the young missionary, the elder left the hut and made his way to the celebration, leaving the teacher on his knees in quiet contemplation.” (Adapted from an Islamic story)

The Sound of Silence

2006-11-01T10:44:00.000Z

As part of Brighton Photo Biennial 2006 Fabrica will show the European premiere of Chilean artist Alfredo Jaar's The Sound of Silence, an installation focusing on the life of South African photojournalist Kevin Carter.
There is a single photographic image in Alfredo Jaar's new installation and this one image is only visible on the screen for a matter of seconds. When you enter Jaar's installation, you enter a story: a story about an individual photograph and its impact but also a story about representation and its unequal effects. As the artist says: "It is a lamentation. It’s a poem that asks about ethics of what we (photojournalists) do when we shoot pain."
Access to The Sound of Silence is carefully controlled. Upon entering the installation space, you are confronted with an unsettling narrative that raises questions about the limits of representation, of what can and should be represented and of the responsibilities not only of the individual photographer but of those who control the circulation and dissemination of the photographic image.
Jaar's work raises questions about the relationship between photography and representation; in other words, between the medium and its political implications.In a context where reality television shows and web-casting purport to democratise the means of representation, Jaar's practice is a timely reminder of the growing gulf between actual representation and its fake imitations.

David Quinn

2006-11-01T10:18:00.000Z

Irish Independent, Friday 22 September 2006:
'Have you heard of the Inquisition? Stupid question. Of course you have. Have you heard of the Crusades? Ditto. Did you also know that when Crusader forces took Jerusalem in 1099 they massacred the inhabitants? Perhaps.
But have you heard of the Committee for Public Safety? Or the massacre of the people of the Vendee in France during the French Revolution? Or did you know that when Muslim forces captured the last Crusader stronghold of Acre in 1291, they massacred the inhabitants? The answer to all these questions is, almost certainly you haven't.
If you know the answer to the first set of questions, but not the second, it is because you are most likely the victim of historical propaganda which presents to the public a demonised version of Christian history, and a carefully sanitised version of what can loosely be called secular history.
In the last 200 years, and especially over the last century, secular ideologies such as Nazism and communism have been responsible for the deaths of an estimated 150 million people. That is more than all the wars of religion in all history. Communism, let it be remembered, presented itself as a humanistic ideology.
I mentioned the Committee for Public Safety a few paragraphs back. It presided over the Terror that was unleashed to 'save' the French Revolution from its enemies. The French Revolution represented the first major appearance of secular thought in history. It managed to kill more people over a few months than the various Inquisitions did over 300 years.
It killed all these people in the name of reason. But why, pray-tell, is the Inquisition a by-word for hatred and intolerance, and the far worse Committee for Public Safety is not. The reason, to borrow a cliche, is that history is written by the victors. The architects of the French Revolution, and their successors to this day, have managed to put their stamp over our history books. The people of the Vendee, incidentally, were massacred because they rose up against the brutal suppression of the Catholic Church by the revolutionaries, again in the name of 'reason'. Between one hundred thousand and two hundred thousand of them were killed for their troubles.
While the majority of Christians by now have some idea about the sometimes brutal history of their faith, the majority of secular-minded people believe implicitly in the sanitised version of their own history. If they knew a bit more about their own history they would be less ready to assume that it is only Christians who have something for which to apologise. '

Upside down

2006-07-11T19:48:00.000+01:00

i want to turn the whole thing upside down i'll find the things they say just can't be found i'll share this love i find with everyone we'll sing and dance to mother nature's songs i don't want this feeling to go away...jack johnson

Jesus the celebrity and his celebrity followers

2006-05-30T10:02:00.000+01:00

the unheard voice

2006-05-24T14:18:00.000+01:00

To those lost and hurting

nothing left to give
nothing left to feel
except sadness, numbness, empty fulfillment
i just want to sleep

can't tell anyone
not that anyone is listening
expectations
be strong
give
again

i got so much love to give
but
either no one wants it
or takes and does not replace

do you see me
i am in a crowded room
but alone
can you see beyond my smile
can you see my frown

oh to find that place
that has a banner that reads
'all welcome'
come join the broken
come join the true
here we don't pretend
we don't judge
here we love
and recieve love

help me to see you
help me to listen
then i might feel again
allow to feel again

the odd one out

2006-05-22T14:04:00.000+01:00

left right

up down

in out

sin holy

black white

hard soft

good bad

... driven

... undriven

... driven

Jesus the celebrity

2006-05-05T09:53:00.003+01:00

he had no beauty
or majesty to attract us to him
he was despised
rejected
a man of sorrows
we esteemed him not

I am entertained by the thought of what would happen to the writer of the above words if they were alive today. The following questions prance in satire on the flood plains of my intellect: in which Christian expression would this writer fit or not fit, not by their choice but by the empty gestures from our ivory towers of fleeting knowledge? Would the writer fall into the evangelical camp who so forth rightly defend god's honor as if the very foundations of belief and the existence of god depended upon it?; perhaps this piece of writing will be used as a 'weakness' by those who choose to data pick to destroy religion?

Christ disciples understand this writing to be a prophetic Annunciation of Jesus, rejected by his own ethnic culture, yet his own rejected him cause he just didn't fit the bill, he just did not look and sound the part. If He were to wonder through the crowds today, through the pews and among the devout, would they unknowingly be drawn to Him as to the image they have inflated of him in their heads, an image they need Him to be not for His sake but theirs? Would his own today be the very faith that exclusively claims to follow him and who today may fulfil that prophet writing? Will the Son of man find faith among the religious when he returns?

He possibly even was no inspiration to those who followed him as their track record was not all that good either but maybe that was not the point...or was it?

It is this mystery that causes many not to believe
because it really does take faith not in what we need to believe but in the encounter that scars us and leaves us wondering, captivated, addicted.

Not quite what we expected
Not quite a celebrity
Not quite what we present either

A man once said while chatting on Skype, 'if only I could meet the Christ, that would change my life'. Is he not found in suffering, in the thirsty, in the rejected? For where he is found, is where we don't want to be. He is not our commodity to consume or product to brand. What he is remains clouded, not hidden, transformative in encounter.

the under flow

2006-04-04T15:25:00.000+01:00

Sunset and evening star,
And one clear call for me!
And may there be no moaning of the bar,
When I put out to sea,
But such a tide as moving seems asleep,
Too full for sound and foam,
When that which drew from out the boundless deep
Turns again home.
Twilight and evening bell,
And after that the dark!
And may there be no sadness of farewell,
When I have crossed the bar.
For though out our bourne of Time and Place
The flood may bear me far,
I hope to see my Pilot face to face
When I have crossed the bar.