Virtual Methodist

It was supposedly meteorologist Edward Lorenz who first suggested the "Butterfly effect" which,  in one version, suggests that a butterfly flapping its wings in China can ultimately cause a hurricane off the coast of America… This has become one of the most widely quoted illustration of that branch of mathematics known as "chaos theory." Well, if that’s the result of 2 butterfly wings, then is it any wonder that the collapse of 2 skyscrapers in New York have produced such chaos in the past 10 years? It devastated the lives of not only those who lost loved ones that day but in many subsequent events the world over. They may have been called the World Trade Centre, but their effect on world trade was probably greater in their demise than during their existence… their fall was like the beginning of a row of dominoes toppling, with the affects spreading wider and wider with the passing years… The cloud of dust they kicked settled on the lungs of thousands of...

Didn't actually use this today - had planned to read it in the hospital service, but forgot to upload it to my Kindle... That's the problem with technology - the idiots using it! Anyway, here is my take on Psalm 46 for today... God is our strength and a safe place to hide, In time of trouble he’s always there to help. So we will not fear, even if the earth should shake And mountains be reduced to rubble, though the seas rage and roar and cities be swept away in the surge. Pause The River of Life sustains the city of God, the holy habitation of the Most High. God is within her walls, so she will stand; God will ride to her rescue with the rising sun. Nations rant and rave, kings and kingdoms fall; The I AM speaks, and the whole earth dissolves . The Almighty I AM is always with us; The God of promise is our protector. Pause Come and see what I AM can do, Sweeping away what we thought to be indestructible. He will bring war to an en...

Over recent weeks I have kept my own counsel regarding the two big controversy's that are orbiting this year's anniversary of the dreadful events of 9/11/2001 (I bow to the illogical US date order of m/d/y on this day alone); the so-called "Ground Zero" mosque and the threatened Koran burning by Terry Jones (not the Monty Python member, but the Pastor of the misnamed "Dove" World Outreach Centre in Gainesville Florida). There is enough coverage out there without me having to add my ill-informed comments from thousands of miles away, and indeed I haven't even offered links to the stories, because if you haven't come across them then you probably haven't been on the planet for the past 2 months. There is an extent to which the oxygen of sensationalist (and at times grossly innacurate) reporting has exacerbated both stories and the response of the wider world to them. On that subject I would like to flag up 2 pieces... one prompted by each story. On...

This is Virtual Methodist's electronic equivalent of those glossy supplements you get in weekend newspapers that take a full week to get through... at least in this household... Its a few of the more developed stories I've come across this week which are too long for a FB post and which I haven't had time or inclination to post on myself. The first involves story of Mary Bale, a 45-year-old bank clerk, and former church choir singer,dropping a cat into a wheelie bin... Now given what happened to our cat while on holiday (and I'm not blogging about that yet... still too angry) I can understand some of the outrage, but I'm with Will Crawley who is bemused by the wholesale hue and cry in the media given the other, bigger issues in the news. One of those issues has dominated Will's blog, and the Northern Ireland news this week, that being the Northern Ireland Police Ombudsman's report into the Claudy bombing back in the very darkest days of our most recent Troub...

Today was almost over before I realised it. 9-11 in my diary today meant a 9-11 am session in the hospital, followed by a series of meetings... And at nowhere today, even in meeting with one American citizen were the events of 7 years ago today even mentioned. Is it because we have seen so much horror inflicted in retribution for that day that the cruel murder of the people in the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and the 4 planes that went down that day no longer has any emotional power over us? Or is it because we have simply moved on? More concerned about the credit crunch and the fuel price hike rather than the loss of so many innocent lives. For me, one of the best responses to the tragedy came in the form of a poem by Godfrey Rust released one year after it. I tried to find it on the net (or even any reference to it) but couldn't... so I rustled around my files and found a paper copy. So here it is: Where was God on September the 11th? He was begging in old clothes in the subw...