Virtual Methodist

I'm probably not going to get a chance to blog as much about 4 Corners Festival Belfast this year as I would like or normally do, because I have barely enough time to write the stuff I absolutely have to write and do for the events I am involved with this week (and my day-job)... Indeed yesterday morning's service on Radio Ulster (which you can listen to on  BBC Sounds for the next month until it self-destructs Mission Impossible-style) was a metaphor for my week, in that we ran out of time and had to axe Mylie Brennan reading my poem/meditation based on St. Francis' " Canticle of Creation ". Of course St. Francis' poem was also part of the inspiration for, and the source of the title of "Laudato si'" the encyclical by Pope Francis about caring for our common home, the Earth. Dr Lorna Gold, our preacher on Sunday morning and lecturer last night in another stimulating event at Jennymount Methodist Church, was, only this week, appointe...

On Valentine's Day my wonderful wife gave me a card. This was unusual. Not just because we don't usually do Valentine's Day stuff, but because in it was the promise of an overnight in Stratford on Avon to see the RSC production of the Tempest which ends tonight. She had conspired with my PA to reschedule my meetings and spirit me away for 36 hours on Thursday and Friday of this week as a wee pick-me-up. We usually head off for a day or two at least the week after the 4 Corners Festival, but that wasn't possible this year because I had some work meetings and deadlines that week, and Sally had to go visit her mum in Scotland. So this little sojourn was very welcome. Doubly so because it was a surprise. Trebly so because The Tempest was the first Shakespeare play I ever performed in, nearly 43 years ago, and so it holds a special place in my heart, despite being one of the Bard's less accessible pieces. I deliberately didn't read any of the reviews of the show once...

Yesterday in church we celebrated the coming Kingdom of Justice... and I was at pains to point out that, as with the concept of peace the previous week, the Hebrew concept of justice or righteousness is so much richer than ours, which is often reduced to a legal/judicial framework... I might come back to that later in the week as it is a live issue in this part of the world at present. But one of the aspects that our limited understanding of justice/righteousness misses out on is the idea of the whole world order being put right again... Every year my wife puts up an advent calendar... You might think that our boys are now beyond such things, but there is generally a scramble to see who gets to open the window each morning (even though there is no chocolate involved this year). I was mightily please however to see that this year's advent calendar includes a very prominent elephant (above)... It reminded me of our 20th anniversary trip to Munich four years ago when the ci...

I do not like to focus on fear... the tabloids (both the paper and TV varieties) do enough of that... be it fear of Muslim extremists, Roma-child-abductors, flesh-eating microbes, rampaging poisonous spiders... You name it, they will try to turn it into a phobia -with the word phobia being used in its sense of irrational fear... Dig deep into most of these stories and you will find little of substance. I also am not into those who build their ministries on a "gospel" of fear... Yes fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom , but it is only a beginning... There are those for whom fear (either at a specific point or a more general fear) was a major feature in their spiritual journey, including Martin Luther, John Newton and John Wesley. Indeed last night I was at a meeting where a Catholic priest spoke of the fear that he had as a child growing up in a mixed area of north Belfast of his home being attacked and he or his family being killed, and how that was a powerful fact...

Following on from yesterday and  Peterson's   comments on the subversive power of parable, his comments on subversion itself are worth noting: "Three things are implicit in subversion. One, the status quo is wrong and must be overthrown if the world is going to be livable. It is so deeply wrong that repair work is futile. The world is, in the word insurance agents use to designate our wrecked cars, totaled.  Two, there is another world aborning that is livable. Its reality is no chimera. It is in existence, though not visible. Its character is known. The subversive does not operate out of a utopian dream but out of a conviction of the nature of the real world. Three, the usual means by which one kingdom is thrown out and another put in its place — military force or democratic elections — are not available. If we have neither a preponderance of power nor a majority of votes, we begin searching for other ways to effect change. We discover the methods of subversion...

Ooops sorry. Been neglecting the blog a little lately (a trend I have noted among fellow bloggers too - has the blogging zeitgeist gone?). Keep forgetting even to post my promised Sunday Psalms... I promise I'll try harder in future... But for the moment here is a wee screen shot of an image I worked up for our Creation themed Cafe Church event last night... It is based on the prose poem “Earth Ball” by Olaf Skarsholt... Selah.

Statistics... Don't you love them. As a long term participant in the Northern Ireland Household Panel Survey (I'll do anything for a £10 gift voucher... well, I'll spend half an hour answering relatively simple questions anyway...) I received the latest findings today. This is based on the 2008 returns, before the current economic downturn really gathered momentum here, but already it has shown a leap in those feeling financially worse off than the previous year (up to 31% from 14%), which in turn has manifested itself ina decrease in the number of people going to the pub once per week or more, down to 14% from 22% back in 2002. However, that trend may be exacerbated by the smoking ban in pubs in the intervening period... although I for one have been happier to go to a pub since that legislation. Whatever the reason these statistics certainly lend substance to the licensees bleating about the downturn in their business. That is until you look at some of the other findings. ...

In the early 1800's much of Michigan was forested. Whilst there are still huge swathes of trees up and down the upper and lower penninsulas, much of the primaeval forest has gone. It fuelled the industrialisation of Michigan, was transformed into furniture for an expanding nation in the factories of Grand Rapids, and was used to build Chicago (and rebuild it after the great fire). It also allowed the expansion of an already established natural phenonenon, producing a landscape feature of amzing beauty, but which also points towards both the power of nature and the limits of human ingenuity. I am referring to the sand dunes on the eastern shore of Lake Michigan. These have been developing as the great glaciers receded after the last ice-age and the Great Lakes emerged, but they have significantly encroached on the land in the wake of the 19th century deforestation. The State Govenment is now trying to protect the dunes from owners of Off Road Vehicles, with only the Dunes at Silver ...