Thanks to Mark Berry for this-
A link to a collection of worship resources, including a setting of a prayer thought to be by the Elizabethan adventurer Sir Francis Drake- he of the cloak-in-the-mud and the bowling-whilst-the-Spanish armada is approaching fame. (Or was that Walter Raleigh?)
It kind of resonated with something I had written before- here.
Here it is- thanks guys!
I had a long day in Helensburgh today- meeting some of my staff, and chairing some reviews. I caught the ferry home amongst the usual mix of commuters and weekend holiday makers-grateful to be heading home.
It has been a tough week- more because of my old internal demons that from time to time drag me back to places that I hoped to leave behind.
Waiting for me was an e-mail someone had sent to the Aoradh website.
Most such e-mails are friendly inquiries or greetings, and this one started in this vein- a woman who is retiring to Dunoon with her husband from abroad, and had been checking out the church situation over here on the internet, and so found her way to our site.
And one article had upset her sufficiently that she felt the need to e-mail to let us know.
This was not for the usual reasons that have brought us to conflict previously- doctrine, Biblical interpretation etc. It was rather because she found something that I had written judgmental and unkind.
Ouch.
It is always harder, I think, when things that you think yourself to be strong in, are found wanting by others. By this I mean that I consider myself to be a pretty tolerant, kind person, who goes to great lengths to be fair and just to others when I can- although I have my petty moments as my friends will tell you! The whole ethos of Aoradh had always been to stand for unity and love, against that brick wall kind of Christianity that finds others wanting.
But here it was- clear evidence that someone else saw me, or at least something I had written, in an entirely different light.
What this lady objected to was this article– and in particular, these words;
There is a new kind of prosperity however, fuelled by the idolatry of the house worshippers. We have a new middle class, who disgorge from the Western Ferry terminal every weekday evening, home to their semi-rural idyll after a hard day in the big city. At the edges of the town, new identikit houses spring up overnight, expensive designer accessories, fitted kitchens and all.
I replied to her e-mail, apologising and trying to explain that this was a piece of creative writing where I was trying to come to terms with being an incomer in this town, and to understand what formed it’s character. I was groping to understand the town’s economy- and the centrality of property. I was wondering in my own mind if the obsession with owning and renovating property (as seen constantly on the TV as well as locally) had become the way that we measured life.
I was wondering if property had become the god of our age.
Now shown to have feet of clay as prices tumble and the credit gravy train derails.
What this ladies motivations for expressing her disapproval, I have no way of knowing. Perhaps the words I wrote were badly chosen- and I certainly have no wish to offend. Perhaps she tends towards the argumentative and dogmatic- a character trait not unheard of within our churches. Perhaps she has a romantic view of the ferry journey over to Dunoon, and my words spoilt a precious image for her.
Was I being unkind and judgmental?
I am not sure. But I still think that these questions are important ones- to ask ourselves.
Because I have a great big rambling house by the sea. I try to use it for others, and fill it with music and friends and fellowship. But I know that it is a source of ego strength- in all its faded glory.
So I bring it again to God, asking him again to use it, and me. I can do nothing else.
As for the complaint- soon the lady concerned will begin her own transplanting into new soil. May she find the kind nutrients and generous watering she requires…
I came across this today, posted by a facebooking friend. It took me back- to the days when i was a student, and the world was a heady mix of possibility and dysfunction…
I had forgotten what a great song it is.
And how the words mean something to my current situation that has been transformed by time.
So my friends- sit down.
Next to me.
In a recent post on his Missional Tribe blog ‘beyond missional’ Frank Viola asked some questions about the effect of the current financial global crisis on Churches, and indeed the Kingdom of God. You can read his post here.
It has been a regular theme of my pondering, and of course, my blogging! See here and here.
It seems that many Church groups and organisations, built as they are on a financial platform that depends on a stable prosperous Western capitalist economy, are beginning to feel the pinch. Church, in this form, is embedded within the dominant economic realities of the day. In it’s organisation at least, it is no different from any other business or institution- it has mortgages, profit and loss, staffing costs and maintenance costs.
Some suggest that the Western world is undergoing a massive shift. Capitalism is reforming, in the face of a crisis as big as it has ever faced before. Some are even asking again whether a system based entirely on expanding the ways in which people can be made to want MORE is sustainable. Particularly as the system also depends on huge inequalities between the consuming countries (in the West) and sweatshops and mines of the South,
Crisis has this way of holding up a mirror through which we can see ourselves from a different perspective. Some Christians are starting to ask again whether this really is the only way to live- and how this reflects our calling as agents of the Kingdom of God.
Perhaps this challenge also falls on our institutions. Has the way that we have done church easily become based on a consumer choice?
Church, becomes a shiny supermarket, at which we buy spirituality- packaged to be portable within our context.
In my country (Scotland) this is less and less relevant, as people simply no longer visit our spiritual supermarkets. For some this is because they have lost their market appeal. I wonder if this is also time for people of faith to stop stacking product, and hoping customers will come to buy. It is time to remember that the church that Jesus loves is built of flesh, and has no steeple…
And to remember again the words of Jesus from Matthew chapter 5, where he calls us to a radically different way of living…
Lest I descend any further into polemic, I am forced to confess my own dependence on this context- my mortgage, my car, my gadgets. And buildings- they have their uses, particularly in our climate!
But I no longer feel the need to put my resources (money time and energy) to sustaining an earthly institution.
Frank Viola quotes Beuchner;
“I also believe that what goes on in them [support groups] is far closer to what Christ meant his Church to be, and what it originally was, than much of what goes on in most churches I know. These groups have no
buildings or official leadership or money. They have no rummage sales, no altar guilds, no every-member canvases. They have no preachers, no choirs, no liturgy, no real estate. They have no creeds. They have no program. They make you wonder if the best thing that could happen to many a church might not be to have its building burned down and to lose all its money. Then all the people would have left is God and each other.”
~ Frederick Buechner, Quoted on pg. 277 of Reimagining Church.
I have found myself part of such as small group as described above, called aoradh. We meet in houses, or village halls, or pubs. We have no paid staff, and things can be pretty chaotic, as we do not have any leaders either. We look for partnerships and create spaces where we can, seeking to be a community who are faced outwards.
This way of being is strangely credit-crunch proof I find!
Another great collection on Radio 4’s start the week programme. Listen again to it here.
There was this fascinating discussion about KINDNESS, relating to this new book, co written by a psycho analyst Adam Philips and Historian Barbara Taylor.
They appear to take the view that our society has retreated from kindness as a way of interacting and engaging with the people around us. We assume that we are no longer inter-dependent and needful of others, and so kindness becomes identified with a kind of weakness and vulnerability.
They go as far as to suggest that we tend naturally towards kindness, but learn to suppress this as we grow into our culture. All Kindness, suggests Philips, is a RISK- but a risk that is transformative in the taking.
There is a review of this book in Guardian by Mary Warnock where she says this
Kindness to others arises out of sympathy. As the authors note, there is much evidence that other animals besides human beings (or “men” as they properly designate them) can enter into the sufferings and fears of others of their kind. But it is human animals alone who, because of their imaginative powers, can enter into the feelings of other people far removed from them, whom they cannot see or touch, but whose plight as fellow-humans they can share
In the Gospel of St Luke, a lawyer is told by Jesus that to live well he must love his neighbour as himself and, when he further asks who is to count as his neighbour, Jesus answers with the story of the good Samaritan, for many the very essence of Christianity. Kindness here arose spontaneously, not in obedience to any rule, in fact in defiance of convention. But as Christianity became increasingly ecclesiastical and hierarchical, with the consequent corruption of the priesthood, the good Samaritan was forgotten.
The new Protestantism declared man to be fundamentally sinful, such good actions as he could do dependent on the grace of God; and so the possibility of natural kindness disappeared.
So we come back to Jesus, and his call to live for a radically different agenda, according to the rules of a New Kingdom. And one of the watch-words of this new kingdom- is kindness.
It is one of those fruit listed by Paul as evidence of the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. (See here for some more ponderings on this.)
When we come into contact with kindness at a point of real need, we rarely forget it. It lives on in our souls. As Paul said in 1 Corinthians- all sorts of other loud and visible manifestations of faith will clang like gongs and then fall silent- but love will last for ever.
Which makes me think again about the myth of the super-Christian. I am interested in the stature aquired and the adoration we give to some of our leaders- perhaps for their charisma, their vision or their oratory power. When one of these paragons of Christianity falls from Grace, how dreadful it seems… how shocking.
Might this be because we measure spirituality according to a strange criteria? We equate knowledge with understanding, declaration with practice and power with ordination from on high.
Might we best return to a simple measure- of kindness shown, and a skew towards grace in all things. These are the leaders I look for. Jesus has ruined the others for me!
So- a new year turns.
If you are like me, you will have been indulging in a little self examination- thinking about how life has been, and what possibilities the new year might bring.
Perhaps you have had thoughts of stepping out the old routines, and opening up some new things- finding new places, new connections and deeper spirituality.
Perhaps you are ready for some adventure. Small ones perhaps- not all of us are Bear Grylls!
Anyone fancy some fish by the way?
Assuming that this is not your fancy- how about joining us for trips into the wilderness to find something slightly more palatable?
If so, we at Aoradh would love to hear from you.
We are planning some trips out into the wild places hereabout- to find places where we can appreciate the beauty of the mountains and hills about us, and also to use some of these spaces for group and individual meditation. These will mostly be based within Argyll, Scotland- or in the Cowal Area, where we are based.
Nick and I have been working on some wilderness meditations- some of which are on the aoradh website- here. We would very much appreciate some folk who are willing to be our guinea pigs (or should I say, Red Squirrels) as we give them a wider road test.
As part of this, a few of us are planning a trip to a small uninhabited island on the bank holiday that begins Friday the 1st of May. We have not finally decided the venue for this yet- there are a couple of possibles, and it rather depends on transport. Past trips away have included trips to Coll, Little Cumbrae and the Garvellachs.
The format of these trips has been that people are prepared to be self supporting- with their own camping and back packing gear. We will then make our own small community for a weekend, in a beautiful, wild and uninhabited space.
For the weekend trip, there may be some transport costs- but that is all, we are not interested in profit- but rather in friendship with each other and a deeper relationship with God.
So we are clear about the legalities of this- we offer a partnership- not a package tour. You come at your own risk!
For those who need to be more organised- we have set some dates for later in the year when we hope to organise one day events- which will include a mediation around a ‘found’ space in the wilderness- caves, rivers, mountains etc.
16th May (Family weekend??)
20th June
18th July
19th September
24th October
contact me for more info!
Pull up a log- sit by the fire. The Kettle is on…
I posted earlier some thoughts about the situation in Gaza, and the response of Christians to Israeli aggression (See here.)
I made a parallel post within the blog network missional tribe– and mentioned a friend of ours who has just returned from Bethlehem where she was working for the Church of Scotland. Jen is not well at the moment- so here’s a prayer for her quick recovery.
Wouldn’t you know it, I had a comment from Chris Hoskins, who had met Jen on a recent trip to Bethlehem!
Chris mentioned a story of hope from Bethlehem, which I thought worth a mention. The news is still full of such pain and violence, that the hope of peace is something that seems to me to be worth nurturing wherever it is seen.
The other think that I struggle with is with my own powerlessness. The internet gives me some kind of voice, but is a passive medium for the most part. Perhaps there may be a way to lend support to something real and tangible…
I went looking for the centre that Chris described- check it out for yourself…
There is some more info here and here.
May they be blessed.
Check out this film– following on from my earlier post about the Charter for Compassion…
Thanks to Brad Sargent, aka futuristguy, for this intriguing insight into a shift in emphasis within the Western Church. He blogs from the USA, but it rang true for me…
It seems to me that the focus or integration points have shifted from ecclesiology (with its inherent concern about methods and models for relevant church planting), to doxology (worship as the key thing to unlock the Kingdom), to theology proper (tinkering with a series of theological issues, like open theism or reforming the reformation), to Christology (with an emphasis on incarnational ministry), to missiology (with an emphasis on being missional and “culturally relevant”).
See here for more on this… but be prepared for some stuff that will hurt your head!
What do you think?
As far as I understand, I think Brad is suggesting a development in the way that radical church movements have sought to engage with the world around us, in this kind of progression;
Now simplistic models of change such as this can never be complete, but as I look at this list- it interests me, as in many ways it mirrors my own journey over the last few years…
7 years ago, I was part of a (mostly) thriving church in the North of England, where I led the
worship team. We had this thing for Scotland, and eventually headed up here in 2002.
In Scotland we attended a small Baptist church, which had rigid structures and traditions that I always found ill fitting. I became more and more interested in looking at the way we did ‘church’, and frustrated at the servicing of a set of dysfunctional systems at the expense of any real engagement with the town we were part of.
However, I was still involved in leading worship- and spent a bit of time in America and in Europe leading worship at conferences. My motivation in worship was very much to sing with all that I could bring to bear so that we might encounter the transforming power of the Holy Spirit. I longed for those moments when the air seemed to crackle with the electric presence of God- but with hindsight, I am convinced that often, we sought to manufacture them, and to overstate our experience to validate our practice… Our group Aoradh started around this time- as a very different animal than it is today.
The small church in Scotland I attended had some real problems, and eventually, sort of ate itself alive. We decided that we had to leave about 3 years ago, and in and around this time, I found myself desperately re-examining the building blocks of my faith and doctrine. I read incessantly, just about everything I could that would enable me to relate again to what this Christianity was all about. I discovered Bell, and McLaren and all sorts of other Emerging Church stuff, and it totally blew me away- before ultimately allowing me once again to adventure with God.
And the central part of this adventure- was Jesus. I fell in love with what he was and is all over again. I read the gospels with eyes wide open, and wept over the sermon on the mount. I am still there really- seeking to find ways to live in community and connected to others, so that I might better be able to celebrate and display the person of Jesus, and serve the people and place I am planted within.
All this time there was talk about post modernity and the need to engage with context in a way that is relevant and appropriate. I worried at times that this mixed in with a stream of folk who just wanted to make the church trendy and hip- which I think has always been beyond me! But I came to believe clearly that we could not longer keep trying to engage in a way that suited the 1950s (That quote from someone who said this comes to mind- If the 1950’s ever come back, we are ready!)
So where am I with this? I know myself to have been on a journey. My hope and prayer is that this journey has many places to visit yet.
May we meet along the way.
Just another Missional Tribe weblog
I have been posting a selection of stuff from this blog onto the Missional tribe weblog (here)- which is throwing up some interesting connections.
I will continue using this blog as my main one, but will paste over stuff as it appears relevant.
Some of the group discussions are well worth checking out too…
this fragile tent 