I like to think that I'm not easily offended; contrary to popular opinion the things you come across as a minister make less not more shockable. However, I think I just have been rubbed up the wrong way by a Christmas ad from a church in New Zealand. Not sure though if I'm offended or just exasperated by the inept stupidity, crassness and frankly pathetic desperation of some Christians.
To find out what it was that got to me and to read some typically sensible comments from my friend John (himself a communications professional) go here.
musings on mission and ministry ... and other miscellaneous mind-leaks
Tuesday, 15 December 2009
Monday, 14 December 2009
Review of Ministerial Training
Friday, 11 December 2009
Preaching - A View From The Pew
In one of his books Fred Craddock, a biblical scholar by profession rather than a homiletician, claims that he writes "as one without authority." A bit tongue in cheek this as Craddock is an experienced preacher who has clearly thought long and hard about the art of the sermon.It does however prompt a question: does anyone know of a book on preaching that is in fact written by a none preacher, someone whose expertise on sermons comes from listening to 'em rather than delivering 'em? I don't, do you?
Evangelical Alliance Ireland and Civil Parntership
This from the Evangelical Alliance Ireland’s report on the civil partnership bill.As followers of a just and compassionate God we can recognise the justice and fairness of providing some legal protection for the reality of both same-sex and opposite-sex cohabiting relationships.
- “just” - check
- “compassionate” - check,
- “justice” - check,
- “fairness” - check,
- “some” - ???????
(Click here to read the full statement)
Thursday, 10 December 2009
Music that made you stand still in wonder
Geoff has tagged me with a music meme. The point is to write about moments when music just made you stand still in wonder, but not to write about your all-time-favourite music.
Aged 6 or 7 - sitting on the stairs hearing my Dad singing The Holy City. It was the first time I realised how well he could sing.
Aged 9 or 10 - on the last night of my holiday in Bridlington sitting on my own on the sea front listening to an electric guitar solo screaming out of the open windows of the caravan park social club. Somehow made me feel strangely grown up.
Aged about 12 - listening to the Karelia Suite at my uncle’s. He was the rich uncle – they had a garden. The sound the of majestically romantic music while staring at the greenery out of the window proved to me that I did like “classical” music after all.
Aged about 20 - late at night hearing a busker playing Rafael Ravenscroft’s famous alto sax solo from Baker Street somewhere round a distant corner at Kings Cross underground station. I think this was when I truly fell in love with the sax.
Aged 35 – standing in Pastor Elise’s yard in Macenta, Guinee for an hour or more almost literally entranced by the his a cappella West African choir.
Aged 36 – that bit in Brassed Off when the band play Rodrigo's Concierto de Aranjuez.
Aged about 38 - hearing Lark Ascending for the first time in the parish church at Bolton Abbey while on retreat. It was as if God had pressed the pause button.
Aged 41 - me in the chapel practicing my new soprano saxophone (my first ever instrument) and actually getting it to sound good (to my ear anyway). Hardly great music, but it was the first time that I had made music myself; like discovering a new level of intimacy with an old friend.
Aged 43 - Billy Bragg at Greenbelt – the way one man with a guitar dominated the stage ten times more effectively than the manic, high-energy, multi-personnel Polyphonic Spree who had been on just before him.
Aged about 44 – a small ensemble form Grimethorpe Colliery Brass Band backing Kate Rusby on Underneath The Stars at Wakefield opera house. Kate’s voice and the mellowest of French horn playing – I melted.
Aged 49 - coming across Christian Forshaw’s rendition of Nunc Dimitis while looking for music for my mum’s funeral. ‘Nuff said.
I'm tagging John Griffiths, Dick Davis, Andy Amoss and Sean Winter
Aged 6 or 7 - sitting on the stairs hearing my Dad singing The Holy City. It was the first time I realised how well he could sing.
Aged 9 or 10 - on the last night of my holiday in Bridlington sitting on my own on the sea front listening to an electric guitar solo screaming out of the open windows of the caravan park social club. Somehow made me feel strangely grown up.
Aged about 12 - listening to the Karelia Suite at my uncle’s. He was the rich uncle – they had a garden. The sound the of majestically romantic music while staring at the greenery out of the window proved to me that I did like “classical” music after all.
Aged about 20 - late at night hearing a busker playing Rafael Ravenscroft’s famous alto sax solo from Baker Street somewhere round a distant corner at Kings Cross underground station. I think this was when I truly fell in love with the sax.
Aged 35 – standing in Pastor Elise’s yard in Macenta, Guinee for an hour or more almost literally entranced by the his a cappella West African choir.
Aged 36 – that bit in Brassed Off when the band play Rodrigo's Concierto de Aranjuez.
Aged about 38 - hearing Lark Ascending for the first time in the parish church at Bolton Abbey while on retreat. It was as if God had pressed the pause button.
Aged 41 - me in the chapel practicing my new soprano saxophone (my first ever instrument) and actually getting it to sound good (to my ear anyway). Hardly great music, but it was the first time that I had made music myself; like discovering a new level of intimacy with an old friend.
Aged 43 - Billy Bragg at Greenbelt – the way one man with a guitar dominated the stage ten times more effectively than the manic, high-energy, multi-personnel Polyphonic Spree who had been on just before him.
Aged about 44 – a small ensemble form Grimethorpe Colliery Brass Band backing Kate Rusby on Underneath The Stars at Wakefield opera house. Kate’s voice and the mellowest of French horn playing – I melted.
Aged 49 - coming across Christian Forshaw’s rendition of Nunc Dimitis while looking for music for my mum’s funeral. ‘Nuff said.
I'm tagging John Griffiths, Dick Davis, Andy Amoss and Sean Winter
Contemporary Trends In Evangelism
What, in your opinion, are the major developments in the practice and theology of evangelism in past 50 years? What do you think are the most significant books on the subject written in recent times? What are the key issues with which students of evangelism in western culture ought to grapple?
What d’ya reckon?
Thursday, 26 November 2009
Political Correctness
It’s official; we are, after all, allowed to use the expression brain-storm.
Apparently Epilepsy Action and The National Society for Epilepsy have said that it is not offensive. So all teachers, trainers, tutors and other flip-chart jockeys can breathe a sigh of relief, forget about thought-showers and just say what comes naturally.
Now, I swear I just heard some of you tittering under your breath there, or sighing and tutting, or, even worse, reaching for the address of the Daily Mail letters page. I’m not surprised. It has become the done thing to deride politically correct censorship of seemingly innocuous words. And I agree that sometimes the humourless attitudes of the p.c. militant tendency is irritating. Their eagerness publically to correct offenders seems to be set to go off with all the sensitivity of the finest of hair-triggered pistols.
But when I calm down and think about it, I have to conclude that they have a point. A big and important point. Truth is, words have power. How many of us have a had their lives blighted by things said to us years ago? Would anyone deny that words such as nigger or paki are politically explosive, socially devastating and profoundly disrespectful? (So much so that I’m curious to see if the editor will have to reach for his asterisk key.)
The power of words in this regard lies in the way they shape how we see people. And surely Christians above all others ought to be alert lest we find ourselves conceiving of fellow human beings in ways that diminish or dishonour them. This is the image of God we are talking about.
The plain, uncomfortable truth is that the way we use words has real consequences in the real world for real people. First we categorise, then we marginalise, then we diminish, then we dismiss and people bleed. Our use of words whether deliberate or unwitting can and does do damage to flesh and blood.
Consider for instance the widespread tendency to default to the word lady rather than woman. This never fails to grate. Most use the word without thinking. Those who do have a motive are usually seeking to express respect. But why on earth should it be disrespectful to use the word woman? What’s wrong with being a woman?
You may well object that there’s nothing wrong with being a lady either. I beg to differ. You see a lady is a certain type of woman. The word lady hangs out with other words such as genteel, delicate, refined. Its constant use predisposes us to see women in ways shaped by these terms and, by implication, to fail to see that it is equally womanly to be robust, vigorous and edgy.
And you don’t have to think too hard to realise that this is related to our denomination’s woeful, gospel-denying record on women in ministry.
My column on preaching a couple of weeks ago elicited a telling response from a friend, a friend who is a very capable minister, a fine preacher and a woman. She commented on how odd it seemed to her that throughout the piece I referred to my ideal preacher using feminine rather than masculine pronouns. She wasn’t complaining, just pointing out how unusual it sounded. And that’s the point. How can something become normal or commonplace if our use of language causes us to see it as odd, remarkable, exceptional?
To me this state of affairs is deeply irritating. To many women I know it is a cause of much pain and the prompt for many tears. We really ought to watch our language.
My turn to do a month's worth of opinion pieces for the Baptist Times' "Outside Edge" column has come round again. With the agreement of the editor I'm posting my BT article here. To check out the Baptist Times as a whole click here.
Apparently Epilepsy Action and The National Society for Epilepsy have said that it is not offensive. So all teachers, trainers, tutors and other flip-chart jockeys can breathe a sigh of relief, forget about thought-showers and just say what comes naturally.
Now, I swear I just heard some of you tittering under your breath there, or sighing and tutting, or, even worse, reaching for the address of the Daily Mail letters page. I’m not surprised. It has become the done thing to deride politically correct censorship of seemingly innocuous words. And I agree that sometimes the humourless attitudes of the p.c. militant tendency is irritating. Their eagerness publically to correct offenders seems to be set to go off with all the sensitivity of the finest of hair-triggered pistols.
But when I calm down and think about it, I have to conclude that they have a point. A big and important point. Truth is, words have power. How many of us have a had their lives blighted by things said to us years ago? Would anyone deny that words such as nigger or paki are politically explosive, socially devastating and profoundly disrespectful? (So much so that I’m curious to see if the editor will have to reach for his asterisk key.)
The power of words in this regard lies in the way they shape how we see people. And surely Christians above all others ought to be alert lest we find ourselves conceiving of fellow human beings in ways that diminish or dishonour them. This is the image of God we are talking about.
The plain, uncomfortable truth is that the way we use words has real consequences in the real world for real people. First we categorise, then we marginalise, then we diminish, then we dismiss and people bleed. Our use of words whether deliberate or unwitting can and does do damage to flesh and blood.
Consider for instance the widespread tendency to default to the word lady rather than woman. This never fails to grate. Most use the word without thinking. Those who do have a motive are usually seeking to express respect. But why on earth should it be disrespectful to use the word woman? What’s wrong with being a woman?
You may well object that there’s nothing wrong with being a lady either. I beg to differ. You see a lady is a certain type of woman. The word lady hangs out with other words such as genteel, delicate, refined. Its constant use predisposes us to see women in ways shaped by these terms and, by implication, to fail to see that it is equally womanly to be robust, vigorous and edgy.
And you don’t have to think too hard to realise that this is related to our denomination’s woeful, gospel-denying record on women in ministry.
My column on preaching a couple of weeks ago elicited a telling response from a friend, a friend who is a very capable minister, a fine preacher and a woman. She commented on how odd it seemed to her that throughout the piece I referred to my ideal preacher using feminine rather than masculine pronouns. She wasn’t complaining, just pointing out how unusual it sounded. And that’s the point. How can something become normal or commonplace if our use of language causes us to see it as odd, remarkable, exceptional?
To me this state of affairs is deeply irritating. To many women I know it is a cause of much pain and the prompt for many tears. We really ought to watch our language.
My turn to do a month's worth of opinion pieces for the Baptist Times' "Outside Edge" column has come round again. With the agreement of the editor I'm posting my BT article here. To check out the Baptist Times as a whole click here.
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