If like me you are concerned about the bill on incitement to religious hatred and how it might work vis-a-vis freedom of speech wrt religious matters, then this may help; at least it explains HM government's intentions on the matter. I draw your attention especially to faqs 4 and 10. THe thing to watch is that it does seem that "insulting words" would be regarded as hate speech. In principle I agree. However, it is a phrase that is somewhat a hostage to fortune: insult may be determined by the person who takes offence [I hope that the courts would take views based on what might be reasonable] which in ideological and religious arenas where the most extreme are most likely to find offence, could mean that criticism eg of the Prophet of Islam, even if couched in moderate and non-inflamatory language, could result in prosecution. So if I say that I have seen evidence from within the Muslim sunna that suggests that the prophet, were he alive today, might be liable to be tried for war crimes; I could be open to prosecution because it is not unlikely that some Muslims would find that offensive; that I am using "insulting words".
So we will have to see on that one. On the other hand this is encouraging and a good counterbalance: "It will also protect people targeted because of their lack of religious beliefs or because they do not share the religious beliefs of the perpetrator." Which could mean that because I do not share the faith of Mohammed's followers, I am not allowed to be targetted because I happen to give reasons for that and becasue I hold beliefs which contradict a muslim's estimation of the moral character of Muhammed. ... I think....
Incitement to Religious Hatred Frequently Asked Questions
21 December 2004
Solar Energy Dish Farms
Interesting and useful for naturally sunny climes.
Alternative Energy Blog - Alt-Energy.org: Improving Solar Technology: Solar Energy Dish Farms
Alternative Energy Cambodia.
LEapfrogging, it's called; developing nations leapfrogging the carbon stage of development straight into alternative energy. Here's an impressive example.
Alternative Energy Blog - Alt-Energy.org: Alternative Energy Cambodia: 100% rural electrification by 2020
20 December 2004
Theatre in Sikh protest
As I have thought about this breaking story I think that there are a few issues that are of wider concern. FIrst thing I need to say is that, as a Christian, I do find some things that go on in popular and not-so-popular culture distressing or even offensive to my faith: paedophilia by those holding office, dishonesty or misconduct by office-holders or on church premsises are chief among thsoe things. However, it seems to me that shooting the messenger, the bearer of bad news, is not the way to deal with it [that has been tried and it makes things worse]. Furthermore, it seems to me that to ban reflection on such sin/wrongdoing even if it be in a play or a film or a novel is likely to convey that we are interested more in cover-ups than in dealing with the truth and the situations constructively. This is the case even if it is a fictionalised exploration of the issues. "In a community where public honour is paramount, is there any room for the truth?" ask the programme notes.
That said, you can perhaps understand why this concerns me: "The protesters claim the play, which centres around two characters and is set in a gurdwara, a Sikh temple, mocks their faith. The play's author has revealed threats had been made against her and she has been advised by police not to say anything in public. Saturday night's protest turned violent at 1845 GMT as around 400 people gathered outside the theatre. " The author is herself of the Sikh community [though I don't know how actively she might practice, though the 'Kaur' in her name suggests that she has taken the vows and been baptised].
It seems to me that certain things must not be allowed to be off-limits and to take discussion of religious abuse out of the public domain is a very serious precedent which I fear would not be to the health of society and actuallly, in the long term religions and their adherants. Abuse and misdeeds thrive on secrecy, religious abuse nore so.
We should remember: "Theatre management insist the play is a work of fiction and no comment is being made about Sikhism as a faith." This is true though I can understand why Sikhs would be worried by the association; mud does stick and it should be the case, imho, that a religious group should be able to challenge portrayals of their faith in a similar way, perhaps to slander or libel laws but perhaps not in a way that smothers dissent. The Author herself , in the programme: 'praises Sikhism, before adding: "Clearly the fallibility of human nature means that the simple Sikh principles of equality, compassion and modesty are sometimes discarded in favour of outward appearance, wealth and the quest for power. I feel that distortion in practice must be confronted and our great ideals must be restored ... I believe that drama should be provocative and relevant. I wrote Behzti because I passionately oppose injustice and hypocrisy."'
I'm concerned that if this incident had taken place under the new laws being proposed in parliament now on religios hate-speech, then the play would have been banned and I am not at all convinced that this would have been healthy. How would I feel if it were a church being portrayed/used? Sad. But I know that making the kind of fuss these folk are making is likely to ensure that greater numbers of people will see it and discuss it and perhaps make worse assumptions about my faith -"Why are they so concerned to keep the issue hushed up ..."; "There's no smoke without fire...".
And I'm afraid that we need to rebrief Christian senior spokesbeings, because I ssuspect that this guy isn't the only one who would say this: "The Roman Catholic Archbishop of Birmingham, the Most Reverend Vincent Nichols, said: "Such a deliberate, even if fictional, violation of the sacred place of the Sikh religion demeans the sacred places of every religion." NO NO NO; what demeans the sacred places of every religions is that such things go on in the first place. Writing about it is part of coming to terms with it in a healthy fashion.
I have one final question which I am genuinely intersted in; by no means is this a rhetorical question: what if it had been a Mosque in a play written by someone nominally, at least, affiliated to Islam. The Salman Rushdie affair tells me the worst outcome but maybe there is room for others?
See also the Guardian article is more detailed and notes also the reactions of younger Sikhs who clearly think that the issues raised should be addressed. Own goal by conservative Sikhs? Maybe.
BBC NEWS | England | West Midlands | Theatre stormed in Sikh protest
STOP PRESS. Just heard that the theatre concerned have pulled the play citing concerns that they cannot any longer guarantee safety of staff or punters.
Interesting comment from report: "Liberal Democrat MP Evan Harris has argued that the proposed law on religious hatred creates a climate in which "any religion's assertion is that their beliefs, leaders, icons and places of worship are protected from criticism, ridicule or parody"."
One Roof at a Time
Nice little story about the effects of solar panels in domestic situation. Seems like the main selling point is seeing the electric meter going backwards on a sunny day ... still I can see that making a big difference to some people.
One Roof at a Time
19 December 2004
An Open Letter to a Digital World
This is written by an experienced IT engineer after spending 5 hours clearing spyware, trojans and the like from his wife's Windoze PC:
"It's time for anyone running a Windows PC to switch to Linux.
You see, the Windows platform is not just insecure - it's patently, blatantly, and unashamedly insecure by design and for all the lip service to security it's really not going to get better, ever. To make matters worse, it's more expensive and gives you fewer necessary applications right out of the box than Linux. Everyone, even Microsoft, knows this - they are just too afraid to say it. "
I've made the switch and if I can do it most people probably can. Try Ubuntu .... see column on the side.
Linux Opinion: An Open Letter to a Digital World (LinuxWorld):
"It's time for anyone running a Windows PC to switch to Linux.
You see, the Windows platform is not just insecure - it's patently, blatantly, and unashamedly insecure by design and for all the lip service to security it's really not going to get better, ever. To make matters worse, it's more expensive and gives you fewer necessary applications right out of the box than Linux. Everyone, even Microsoft, knows this - they are just too afraid to say it. "
I've made the switch and if I can do it most people probably can. Try Ubuntu .... see column on the side.
Linux Opinion: An Open Letter to a Digital World (LinuxWorld):
Flouting scientific opinion
Another good reference article to have in hand in relation to the Crichton book. References to the actual consensus over climate change in scientific circles and refutations of some of the main 'arguments' of the book
Flouting scientific opinion, Stossel promoted M ... [Media Matters for America]
Flouting scientific opinion, Stossel promoted M ... [Media Matters for America]
Bewary: wilful misquotes
There's sometimes a lot at stake so have a look at this case of journalisitc disintegrity:
to ensure that a quotation fits with his message. According to Milloy, Thompson said, “Any prudent person would agree that we don’t yet understand the complexities with the climate system.” But what he actually said was “Any prudent person would agree that we don’t yet understand the complexities with the climate system and, since we don’t, we should be extremely cautious in how much we ‘tweak’ the system.” (see full press release here). Such manipulations are designed so that Milloy can’t be accused of misquoting,
It's such a shame that so many in the USA particularly seem so keen to believe that they don't have to face up to anthropogenic climate change ... denial isn't a just river in Egypt ....
REad the whole artilce to get a better sense of the scientific consensus [yes it really is that] on climate change. Better browse the whole blog and add it to your collection of RSS feeds.
RealClimate � Fox News gets it wrong
to ensure that a quotation fits with his message. According to Milloy, Thompson said, “Any prudent person would agree that we don’t yet understand the complexities with the climate system.” But what he actually said was “Any prudent person would agree that we don’t yet understand the complexities with the climate system and, since we don’t, we should be extremely cautious in how much we ‘tweak’ the system.” (see full press release here). Such manipulations are designed so that Milloy can’t be accused of misquoting,
It's such a shame that so many in the USA particularly seem so keen to believe that they don't have to face up to anthropogenic climate change ... denial isn't a just river in Egypt ....
REad the whole artilce to get a better sense of the scientific consensus [yes it really is that] on climate change. Better browse the whole blog and add it to your collection of RSS feeds.
RealClimate � Fox News gets it wrong
Something about this ...
If you like it there's more interesting street art at the ref'd website.
Wooster Collective : Stickers / Posters / Graf / Culture Jamming
18 December 2004
Guerilla carolling
I wish I'd seen this a few weeks ago. I need to mark this in my memeory for next year. And I want to know where to find more lyrics like this
"Slow down ye frantic shoppers for there's something we must say
If you would spare a moment all the stores would go away
Big business has been telling us what Christmas means today
Now it's time we decided for ourselves, for ourselves
Yes, it's time we decided for ourselves..."
SojoNet: Faith, Politics, and Culture Buy Nothing Christmas
"
"Slow down ye frantic shoppers for there's something we must say
If you would spare a moment all the stores would go away
Big business has been telling us what Christmas means today
Now it's time we decided for ourselves, for ourselves
Yes, it's time we decided for ourselves..."
SojoNet: Faith, Politics, and Culture Buy Nothing Christmas
"
Amen to Peace on Earth
"...In my view, a better solution, or 'revenge,' would be to match Osama bin Laden's fortune, dollar for dollar, and then get our Middle Eastern allies to do the same. While bin Laden continues to use his fortune to train terrorists, we -- i.e., Arab nations, Israel, and the USA -- could use our combined fortune and go into the wretched Palestinian refugee camps and build beautiful little villages, filled with fountains, orange trees, olive groves -- and, above all, filled with hope. We could then move on to Afghanistan and do the same there, and in Pakistan, and keep on going, and going."
Amen!
Myth*ing Links' The Crone Papers: Notes on the Mideast:
How to Save the World
Go on: scare yourself or inspire yourself [depending on your personality's typical reaction to challenge] ... the very serious resolutions and actions of one man determined to live within a fair ecological footprint.
I'll have to think about how I respond to his more radical plan 'B' but it makes you think. Good links to follow up too.
How to Save the World
A Schadenfreud moment
"Cuba complained earlier this week to the US mission about its decorations which included a reference to 75 Cuban dissidents jailed last year"
Can't blame them really; what's the point of provoking people like that?
BBC NEWS | World | Americas | Cuba counters US Christmas lights:
Murtadd
Interesting insight into the Muslim world: my favourite progresive muslim site has been hacked and attacked by islamists accusing those who run it of murtadd which apparently means apostasy. This, of course, amounts to a death-threat from these people. Stakes are high for progressive Muslims; but then I guess that was true in the Reformation period for Christians on both sides ...
Muslim WakeUp! Blog Comment on anti-MWU! Attack
Muslim WakeUp! Blog Comment on anti-MWU! Attack
The Digital Divide Network
Binging together concern for just resource use and ITC.... It also has a series of introductory articles on things like RSS feeds, so it could be a useful bookmark to pass on to friends who are wondering what all this blogging stuff is about.
The Digital Divide Network
The Digital Divide Network
Rendering DC Irrelevant
An encouraging little pointer to the fact that the states in the US have considerable freedom to mitigate central government policy on things like the environment
WorldChanging: Another World Is Here: Rendering DC Irrelevant
WorldChanging: Another World Is Here: Rendering DC Irrelevant
Make a Teleprompter!
I think I'm a bit of a sucker for cheap cludges and as they go this is pretty good. Could be a useful idea for me at a future date or for you sooner. I could even imagine that an alt.worship set-up might find it useful sometime.
creativepro.com - Bit by Bit: Forget Cue Cards, Make a Teleprompter!
creativepro.com - Bit by Bit: Forget Cue Cards, Make a Teleprompter!
17 December 2004
grid::blog::gospel -rationale
I posted two grid::blog::gospel items yesterday [this one and this one] and feel that perhaps I should explain something of why the gospel is explained in them the way it is.
My own sense of what we need to communicate comes out of a sense that people really are looking for something 'spiritual' but that the way that we have been putting our core message is being heard in ways that we don't necessarily want. People tend to have a pre-suposition that we are about laying rules, oughtage and mustery on them in a way that is likely to be life-denying and distorting of their humanity. Furthermore when we speak we tend to confirm this picture; we talk of sinfulness which is understood widely in body-hating and pleasure denying ways and we talk about punishment which can only carry the connotation of God being 'on our case' and confirm the negative message stereotypes.
I used ancient authors too because of making a connection with the sense that the ancients have something to teach is, which is a part of comntemporary spiritual searching and these quotes I think convey a sense of spiritual reality and of the 'mystical' which I think is important to present.
I've tried to set out my vision for gospel proclamation in a way that starts with goodness, joy, life-affirmation and human potential. I don't believe that peopl are unwilling to recognise 'sin' -they are quite wiling to admit they/we foul up, often big-time. but the baggage of our sin language is just too heavy for the intended communication to handle. We need to show how the gospel really is good news and how it akes sense of the spiritual search that is already going on.
Ideally, of course, we have a different way of putting it over to each individual we meet, having listened to their story and to the spoken and unspoken spiritual search and perhaps even tentatively identified the touches of the Holy Spirit in their life ...
My own sense of what we need to communicate comes out of a sense that people really are looking for something 'spiritual' but that the way that we have been putting our core message is being heard in ways that we don't necessarily want. People tend to have a pre-suposition that we are about laying rules, oughtage and mustery on them in a way that is likely to be life-denying and distorting of their humanity. Furthermore when we speak we tend to confirm this picture; we talk of sinfulness which is understood widely in body-hating and pleasure denying ways and we talk about punishment which can only carry the connotation of God being 'on our case' and confirm the negative message stereotypes.
I used ancient authors too because of making a connection with the sense that the ancients have something to teach is, which is a part of comntemporary spiritual searching and these quotes I think convey a sense of spiritual reality and of the 'mystical' which I think is important to present.
I've tried to set out my vision for gospel proclamation in a way that starts with goodness, joy, life-affirmation and human potential. I don't believe that peopl are unwilling to recognise 'sin' -they are quite wiling to admit they/we foul up, often big-time. but the baggage of our sin language is just too heavy for the intended communication to handle. We need to show how the gospel really is good news and how it akes sense of the spiritual search that is already going on.
Ideally, of course, we have a different way of putting it over to each individual we meet, having listened to their story and to the spoken and unspoken spiritual search and perhaps even tentatively identified the touches of the Holy Spirit in their life ...
"When Blobjects Rule the Earth"
If you're like me [being aMyers-Briggs N] you may like to indulge in lovely speculations about what may yet come to pass, to play with the ideas of how things may develop .. probably why science fiction appeals; I wonder if they've done a correlative study of N's and science fiction readers?
Anyway for those who indulge in such woolgathering this article is for yea; replete with definitions of 'blobjects', 'gizmos' and 'spimes' -yes it puzzled me too; it appears to be a portmanteu word based on 'speculative' and 'imaginary' or possibly 'space' and 'time' -for why? -Read the blessed article; do I have to do all the work?
I liked too the fact that the darkside of it all is explored: "Things need to change quickly and radically, because the industrial system we have today cannot persist. It cannot find enough energy and raw materials. Instead of moving forward, our civilization is surrounding the oil wells with fixed bayonets and settling into a smog-shrouded Dark Age.
The shape of things today is condemning our world to steadily increasing poverty, degradation, and turmoil. Four planets couldn't supply the material and energy to let the world live the so-called advanced world lives now.
We're pretty advanced, but we're nowhere near advanced enough."
BoingBoing: Bruce Sterling SIGGRAPH 2004 speech "When Blobjects Rule the Earth"
Anyway for those who indulge in such woolgathering this article is for yea; replete with definitions of 'blobjects', 'gizmos' and 'spimes' -yes it puzzled me too; it appears to be a portmanteu word based on 'speculative' and 'imaginary' or possibly 'space' and 'time' -for why? -Read the blessed article; do I have to do all the work?
I liked too the fact that the darkside of it all is explored: "Things need to change quickly and radically, because the industrial system we have today cannot persist. It cannot find enough energy and raw materials. Instead of moving forward, our civilization is surrounding the oil wells with fixed bayonets and settling into a smog-shrouded Dark Age.
The shape of things today is condemning our world to steadily increasing poverty, degradation, and turmoil. Four planets couldn't supply the material and energy to let the world live the so-called advanced world lives now.
We're pretty advanced, but we're nowhere near advanced enough."
BoingBoing: Bruce Sterling SIGGRAPH 2004 speech "When Blobjects Rule the Earth"
Weaving The Future
I didn't realise that designing wearable computing was so far advanced ...
WorldChanging: Another World Is Here: Weaving The Future
More Flexible Solar
A few links here to recent solar cell developments which make portability a key concept. Low efficiencies though.
WorldChanging: Another World Is Here: More Flexible Solar
WorldChanging: Another World Is Here: More Flexible Solar
Consumer H2 FCV in 2005
Something to make me thing that having a hydrogen powered vehicle in the near future may not be a crazy idea ..
Green Car Congress: ZAP and Anuvu Shoot for a Consumer H2 FCV in 2005
Polymeal
I suspect that this word wil be one we will be hearing more of in 2005; you saw it here first!
SocietyGuardian.co.uk | Society | How to live longer: a Polymeal a day
SocietyGuardian.co.uk | Society | How to live longer: a Polymeal a day
Hydrogen developments
Nice little article on how fuel-cell tech is being used and developed.
IDFuel, the Industrial Design Weblog
IDFuel, the Industrial Design Weblog
A Whitewashed Earthsea
Ursula le Guin is a quite outstanding fantasy novellist and her Earthsea series is a crown of her achievement. Small wonder, then, that someone has brought it to the TV and appropriately enough it's the SciFi channel [if only we could get it on Freeview]. However, in casting the main character ad a petulant white kid, they have understandably upset the authror who subtly but explicitly has a 'indian' complexion for Ged. In this article she explains why: the reason won't entirly translate to screen but I feel she as a point about authotial intention on this one.
"My protagonist is Ged, a boy with red-brown skin. In the film, he's a petulant white kid."
A Whitewashed Earthsea - How the Sci Fi Channel wrecked my books. By Ursula K. Le Guin:
"My protagonist is Ged, a boy with red-brown skin. In the film, he's a petulant white kid."
A Whitewashed Earthsea - How the Sci Fi Channel wrecked my books. By Ursula K. Le Guin:
16 December 2004
I'm a bad christian
But you'd have to be a right-wing USAmerican reading the bible through a particular ideology to agree ... So I discover this site of fellow 'bad Christians' whose only crime, like me, is to realise that the Bible doesn't actually support the fundamentalist right. To take the test you have to go through a registration process which presupposes being USAmerican, so I had to decide that I was a Virginian [well, I've lived in Virginia for a few weeks] and then I found that quite a lot of constitutional issue I din't have much opinion about, unsurprisingly. Still a bit of fun for spotting a bias in questionnaire design! What I find amusing is how some of my answers are 'incorrect' -I think that the designers may need to question some of their assumptions against what scripture might really say. Have a look at my results [if they are accessible].
SOme of the questions are just potty "George W. Bush is the President of the United States of America" easy points to be picked up but, well, I couldn't be bothered to strongly agree, I wanted a response that said 'And your point is ..?' And a lot of the questions were, well, kind of not really the point or somehow starting in the wrong place for me, so I did the wishy-washy thing and tended to agree or disagree a lot, because there were other things that might be said. Life begins at conception? Well yes, and then what is the point of that statement -especially as the writers are clearly aiming to end it later on if you are really bad -or just happen to be an enemy of the state at the time? And it doesn't deal with the issue of hominisation anyway. In fact I think life begins before conception ... ?
Fun ...
a badchristian blog... - how to tell if you're a bad christian
SOme of the questions are just potty "George W. Bush is the President of the United States of America" easy points to be picked up but, well, I couldn't be bothered to strongly agree, I wanted a response that said 'And your point is ..?' And a lot of the questions were, well, kind of not really the point or somehow starting in the wrong place for me, so I did the wishy-washy thing and tended to agree or disagree a lot, because there were other things that might be said. Life begins at conception? Well yes, and then what is the point of that statement -especially as the writers are clearly aiming to end it later on if you are really bad -or just happen to be an enemy of the state at the time? And it doesn't deal with the issue of hominisation anyway. In fact I think life begins before conception ... ?
Fun ...
a badchristian blog... - how to tell if you're a bad christian
Crichton's eco rant-novel
Michael Crichton has written a novel which is a rant at climate change science. Because novels like this often find that their background is taken for fact it is important to know what the real science is; just in case so check out this page.
And then another spot of fact-based rebuttal...
And then another spot of fact-based rebuttal...
Broadband costs set to fall
Well, a month or two back the Phone Coop [my ISP] dropped their prices and I can clearly look forward to further drops in the new year. Since comms is a big bill in our household; this is good news.
Incidently I recommend the
phone coop because they are a co-operative; the customer owns the company.
Guardian Unlimited Money | Special_reports | Broadband costs set to fall
Incidently I recommend the
phone coop because they are a co-operative; the customer owns the company.
Guardian Unlimited Money | Special_reports | Broadband costs set to fall
Klimmtey
Love this image: so Klimmt-like; truly magical. Visit the source site and enjoy.
Wooster Collective : Stickers / Posters / Graf / Culture Jamming
Rest in God [Grid::Blog::Gospel]
In 397 St.Augustine wrote those words [in Latin] on the first page of a book he entitled "Confessions".
"O God you have made us for yourself and our hearts are restless till they find their rest in you"
He was living in Roman North Africa at a time when the Empire was beginning to collapse. It was a time of great uncertainty and anxiety for everybody. Augustine wrote about how he had come to be a Christian from a background of worldly 'success' in career and with women. He had tried joining a religious cult (today it would be called 'new age') but had turned from that.
O God, You made us for Yourself. In his prayer Augustine reminds us that we are made for God. This is great news for us because it reminds us that God is interested in us. We are not just specks of insignificant matter on the face of an indifferent or even hostile universe. We are made for relationship with God; we are made to share God's love, joy, and peace. We are designed to 'run on' God's own eternal life and not just the biological life we begin at conception. Some Christian thinkers put this as 'sharing in the Divine Life', 'participating in uncreated glory'.
This means that we are in some way incomplete, unfulfilled, 'not firing on all cylinders' until we are in an affirming and positive relationship with God. Hence ....
.... And our hearts are restless. Augustine recognised in all the things that he had tried that he had really been searching for the rest, the peace, the contentment, that God only could give. Like Augustine, we often find in ourselves an aching restlessness, a lack of inner [and outer] peace. We often, like Augustine, try to fill up on other things; work and career, and sexual relations, but also food, buying things, alcohol or drugs, off-beat religion or things like astrology or tarot. People also try throwing themselves into marriage, family and other relationships to find the peace and wholeness of God.
When we try to deal with our spiritual hunger in these ways its a bit like starving people trying to assuage their hunger by eating grass or other non-foods. It does indeed fill their stomach and may take away some fo the hunger but malnourishment is still an issue and death draws closer.
We do find joy and peace in the good things of this world. This is because they reflect God's nature blessing and love. When we find good human relationships, beautiful experiences, satisfying work we can take delight and comfort in them because they are intended to be God's means of conveying something of Divine light and truth. However, they aren't the whole thing and nothing, ultimately substitutes for a personal relationship to the Giver of the good gifts. We will constantly find that they lose their 'enchantment' for us and we still have not found our rest.
Till they find their rest in You. How can our hearts find their rest in God? As we focus our lives on Jesus Christ, he shares with us his relationship with the heavenly Father. He said, "Come to me all who labour and are heavy laden and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls." [Matthew 11:28-29].
The invitation is to come to him and learn. You don't need to get yourself straight to come to him and begin to find rest. Part of what you learn from him will start to straighten you out. He will teach you how to live in God's rest and how to live in relationship with your loving heavenly Father.
See also Rationale.
"O God you have made us for yourself and our hearts are restless till they find their rest in you"
He was living in Roman North Africa at a time when the Empire was beginning to collapse. It was a time of great uncertainty and anxiety for everybody. Augustine wrote about how he had come to be a Christian from a background of worldly 'success' in career and with women. He had tried joining a religious cult (today it would be called 'new age') but had turned from that.
O God, You made us for Yourself. In his prayer Augustine reminds us that we are made for God. This is great news for us because it reminds us that God is interested in us. We are not just specks of insignificant matter on the face of an indifferent or even hostile universe. We are made for relationship with God; we are made to share God's love, joy, and peace. We are designed to 'run on' God's own eternal life and not just the biological life we begin at conception. Some Christian thinkers put this as 'sharing in the Divine Life', 'participating in uncreated glory'.
This means that we are in some way incomplete, unfulfilled, 'not firing on all cylinders' until we are in an affirming and positive relationship with God. Hence ....
.... And our hearts are restless. Augustine recognised in all the things that he had tried that he had really been searching for the rest, the peace, the contentment, that God only could give. Like Augustine, we often find in ourselves an aching restlessness, a lack of inner [and outer] peace. We often, like Augustine, try to fill up on other things; work and career, and sexual relations, but also food, buying things, alcohol or drugs, off-beat religion or things like astrology or tarot. People also try throwing themselves into marriage, family and other relationships to find the peace and wholeness of God.
When we try to deal with our spiritual hunger in these ways its a bit like starving people trying to assuage their hunger by eating grass or other non-foods. It does indeed fill their stomach and may take away some fo the hunger but malnourishment is still an issue and death draws closer.
We do find joy and peace in the good things of this world. This is because they reflect God's nature blessing and love. When we find good human relationships, beautiful experiences, satisfying work we can take delight and comfort in them because they are intended to be God's means of conveying something of Divine light and truth. However, they aren't the whole thing and nothing, ultimately substitutes for a personal relationship to the Giver of the good gifts. We will constantly find that they lose their 'enchantment' for us and we still have not found our rest.
Till they find their rest in You. How can our hearts find their rest in God? As we focus our lives on Jesus Christ, he shares with us his relationship with the heavenly Father. He said, "Come to me all who labour and are heavy laden and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls." [Matthew 11:28-29].
The invitation is to come to him and learn. You don't need to get yourself straight to come to him and begin to find rest. Part of what you learn from him will start to straighten you out. He will teach you how to live in God's rest and how to live in relationship with your loving heavenly Father.
See also Rationale.
[Grid::Blog::Gospel] Lovable, rejoicing God
"God is the one loveable who is always rejoicing world without end in infinite happiness." (Gregory, Bishop of Nyssa, died 395)
I find this idea of God very helpful and a distillation of biblical revelation of God. God has no need of the world, or of us, to make him happy or to fulfill some need. God has created us out of sheer grace and benevolence. God has created us to share in infinite happiness; to share in God's own always-rejoicing life.
A bit of a different picture from God as dour and killjoyish which seems to be all too common. God is the foundation of all that we perceive to be real life, joy, truth, goodness and beauty.There's an original blessing at the back of it all. God's first action towards wo/man, according to Genesis 1:28, was to bless and to give a share in the divine creativity and sustaining of the world. Our very being is rooted in God's blessing. Irenaeus of Lyons wrote that "The glory of God is a human being who is fully alive".
Unhappily we know that we do not live out of a sense of this blessing and neither do we live out of God's infinite happiness; we do not have that participation in God's own eternal & rejoicing life. Our being cries out to know deeply the life and the joy of God yet we find ourselves unfulfilled. And, in our unfulfilment, we look to created things to satisfy us. And so we try to feed our hunger and slake our thirst by fastening ourselves to things and people. We look for a sense of fulfilment or a sense of human-ness or a sense of self-worth in pleasure, doing good or relationships. So we find ourselves looking to sex, chemicals, food, self-denial, charity work, romance, power, family and so on to help us gain a feeling of aliveness or simply to keep despair at bay.
Not that those things are bad: -in themselves thay are good. They reflect the God-ness /goodness of the creator. In the Genesis story God says all that is made is 'good'. One of the reasons we find a degree of satisfaction [and even transcendence] in them is that they have God's goodness at the back of them. The part of us that is supposed to respond to God is, for a time, satisfied with things that have something of God about them.
Back to the future.... What needs to happen is that we human beings need to get into a positive relationship with God. We need to be able to sense God in all that is good. We need to know where to go so that what eludes our grasp can be placed into our hands.
Jesus Christ offers to do this for us. In a sense, his offer is to place into our hands what eludes us; right relationship to God, God's love, joy, peace, fulfilment, and a rediscovery of our true humanity. In his life and teaching he offers us a route to learning how to live in the goodness that He brings to us. In his death he takes on and defeats the forces that seek to deprive us of God's goodness (whether forces outside us or within us). In his rising from the grave he releases the power of God into the world so that we may overcome the negative forces and in his teaching he shows us how to live in that power.
The relationship that Jesus has with God is shared with us. He knows & addresses God as Father, and so may we. He lives in right relationship to God and shares that relationship with us. He commands the power of Good and shares it with us so we may learn to do what he did. He has eternal life and 'holds the keys of death' and shares that with us.
So how can we make sure that we receive into our being all that Christ has to share with us? Clearly if Christ has eternal life, forgiveness, relationship with God, love, joy, peace .... then the question is how we can make sure that we are able to make those things part of our life and experience.
Jesus said: "For my Father's will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life ...." When we believe in Christ we become sharers in eternal life. In modern times in the west "believe" has become a pale shadow of what it means in this passage. Often western people use it like it means 'has the opinion that he existed... or that he is God's Son'. But opinion is only part of it. Believe means to trust Christ enough to begin to be in a relationship with him which goes to the heart of who you really are and may call into question who you think you are and where you're going with your life. When that happens Christ will, by his Spirit, become a real presence at the centre of your life. Christ will be at the wellspring of your being and from him will flow the blessings that God wants you to share from God's very own being and goodness.
Baptism is the sign of this connecting with Christ Spirit to spirit, heart to heart being to being. It conveys to us God's promise and represents our own response of trust and commitment
See also Rationale.
I find this idea of God very helpful and a distillation of biblical revelation of God. God has no need of the world, or of us, to make him happy or to fulfill some need. God has created us out of sheer grace and benevolence. God has created us to share in infinite happiness; to share in God's own always-rejoicing life.
A bit of a different picture from God as dour and killjoyish which seems to be all too common. God is the foundation of all that we perceive to be real life, joy, truth, goodness and beauty.There's an original blessing at the back of it all. God's first action towards wo/man, according to Genesis 1:28, was to bless and to give a share in the divine creativity and sustaining of the world. Our very being is rooted in God's blessing. Irenaeus of Lyons wrote that "The glory of God is a human being who is fully alive".
Unhappily we know that we do not live out of a sense of this blessing and neither do we live out of God's infinite happiness; we do not have that participation in God's own eternal & rejoicing life. Our being cries out to know deeply the life and the joy of God yet we find ourselves unfulfilled. And, in our unfulfilment, we look to created things to satisfy us. And so we try to feed our hunger and slake our thirst by fastening ourselves to things and people. We look for a sense of fulfilment or a sense of human-ness or a sense of self-worth in pleasure, doing good or relationships. So we find ourselves looking to sex, chemicals, food, self-denial, charity work, romance, power, family and so on to help us gain a feeling of aliveness or simply to keep despair at bay.
Not that those things are bad: -in themselves thay are good. They reflect the God-ness /goodness of the creator. In the Genesis story God says all that is made is 'good'. One of the reasons we find a degree of satisfaction [and even transcendence] in them is that they have God's goodness at the back of them. The part of us that is supposed to respond to God is, for a time, satisfied with things that have something of God about them.
Back to the future.... What needs to happen is that we human beings need to get into a positive relationship with God. We need to be able to sense God in all that is good. We need to know where to go so that what eludes our grasp can be placed into our hands.
Jesus Christ offers to do this for us. In a sense, his offer is to place into our hands what eludes us; right relationship to God, God's love, joy, peace, fulfilment, and a rediscovery of our true humanity. In his life and teaching he offers us a route to learning how to live in the goodness that He brings to us. In his death he takes on and defeats the forces that seek to deprive us of God's goodness (whether forces outside us or within us). In his rising from the grave he releases the power of God into the world so that we may overcome the negative forces and in his teaching he shows us how to live in that power.
The relationship that Jesus has with God is shared with us. He knows & addresses God as Father, and so may we. He lives in right relationship to God and shares that relationship with us. He commands the power of Good and shares it with us so we may learn to do what he did. He has eternal life and 'holds the keys of death' and shares that with us.
So how can we make sure that we receive into our being all that Christ has to share with us? Clearly if Christ has eternal life, forgiveness, relationship with God, love, joy, peace .... then the question is how we can make sure that we are able to make those things part of our life and experience.
Jesus said: "For my Father's will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life ...." When we believe in Christ we become sharers in eternal life. In modern times in the west "believe" has become a pale shadow of what it means in this passage. Often western people use it like it means 'has the opinion that he existed... or that he is God's Son'. But opinion is only part of it. Believe means to trust Christ enough to begin to be in a relationship with him which goes to the heart of who you really are and may call into question who you think you are and where you're going with your life. When that happens Christ will, by his Spirit, become a real presence at the centre of your life. Christ will be at the wellspring of your being and from him will flow the blessings that God wants you to share from God's very own being and goodness.
Baptism is the sign of this connecting with Christ Spirit to spirit, heart to heart being to being. It conveys to us God's promise and represents our own response of trust and commitment
See also Rationale.
TEUrkey?
Why should we be concerned about whether Turkey becomes part of the EU? I reckon this article helps us to understand, particularly apposite is this remark: "there is concern about terrorism. But the best thing to fight this would be for Christian and Muslims to come together, to stand under the same flag of the European Union"
For other reports on the matter there is another from the Guardian giving the pros and cons and this one from the BBC which looks at it from the point of view of France and other EU countries with some interesting figures...
Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | From falaka to baklava:
For other reports on the matter there is another from the Guardian giving the pros and cons and this one from the BBC which looks at it from the point of view of France and other EU countries with some interesting figures...
Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | From falaka to baklava:
15 December 2004
Apologetics style
This seems to be me and I think it's not unfair though I certainly wouldn't go as far as to say that I confound people with my knowledge: sometimes I confuse them and sometimes it seems to have little effect at all ...
QuizFarm.com
 | You scored as Evidentialist. You are an evidentialist! Apologetics primarily consists in showing the good reasons one has to believe the claims of Christianity. You consistently confound unbelievers with your knowledge of history, science, and Bayesian computation that you learned from John Warwick Montgomery, Gary Habermas, and Richard Swinburne.
What kind of apologist are you? created with QuizFarm.com |
QuizFarm.com
Crichton's eco rant-novel
climte debate
Good page following a BBC programme on climate change [links available to watch and listen] Pretty interesting reading the feedback from people all round the world too ...
BBC NEWS | Have Your Say | How can climate treaty be strengthened?
Noel; a good day to die?
This should be a warning for us; In USA there is a 12% greater risk of dying on December 25 and the following few days than other days in the year -even accounting for winter's seasonal increase in deathrate [those of us who do funerals know about this]. Why might this be so? Two things emerge as most likely consistently from 26 years of data: "people tend to delay seeking care for symptoms. Another is that there are often changes in medical staff during the holidays and, consequently, the quality of medical care might be compromised"
CNN.com - Study: Christmas deadliest day for Americans - Dec 13, 2004
CNN.com - Study: Christmas deadliest day for Americans - Dec 13, 2004
testing obliquity
Interesting figures about cheating in school tests -and not only by the students. The issue revolves around how high the stakes are riding on the results; not good news for Britian's SAT's etc. Worth thinking about by all involved in education. obliquity again: the effects of trying for one thing bringing about soemthing else, in this case something not so good.
14 December 2004
Submerge the urge [to shop]
As an advocate of selective resistance to consumerism, an article that outlines some important issues in the psychology of shopping seems important to me. As a life coach, an article that helps us to plan our shopping to make the most of it seems like a Godsend. Get this:
"'Shopping momentum arises from this reasonable idea that shopping has an inertial quality, that there is a hurdle to shift from browsing to shopping, which, once crossed, makes further purchases more likely.'"
This makes it possible to come up with counteracting strategies like this: "Fortunately, Dhar and Huber have found a most pleasant way to head off the momentum. Make your first purchase a guilty pleasure, and something akin to remorse takes hold. Your subsequent purchases are restrained, and you emerge from your shopping trip within budget and bounds."
Also look for places where you have to use multiple ocounters to pay rather than a single checkout [like a supermarket]. ""We speculate that multiple checkout counters disrupt the momentum," Dhar says. "If you have to open your wallet and pay again, that can make you stop.""
Santa Pause (washingtonpost.com):
13 December 2004
Don't just take my word for it
Here's a neat little article on why 
Open Office.org beat M$ Office. It puts it succinctly and effectively. Read it an plan never to upgrade again, just download [for free] OO.o. Treat yourself and your church or organisation to good software that you don't have to buy and won't need to licence. It hardly makes sense not to.
And while you're at it think about dumping windoze -or at least beginning the migration process to linux. Here's a nice littel article pointing out that a commercial Linux solution is 27% cheaper in terms of total cost of ownership and that's before taking into account lower staff resources, lower malware costs and less downtime on the part of linux and even tripling the consultancy fees for linux system.
Commentary: Why OpenOffice.org?
Linux TCO
Open Office.org beat M$ Office. It puts it succinctly and effectively. Read it an plan never to upgrade again, just download [for free] OO.o. Treat yourself and your church or organisation to good software that you don't have to buy and won't need to licence. It hardly makes sense not to.
And while you're at it think about dumping windoze -or at least beginning the migration process to linux. Here's a nice littel article pointing out that a commercial Linux solution is 27% cheaper in terms of total cost of ownership and that's before taking into account lower staff resources, lower malware costs and less downtime on the part of linux and even tripling the consultancy fees for linux system.
Commentary: Why OpenOffice.org?
Linux TCO
Flew in from the cuckoo's nest
Recently I heard that Anthony Flew has renounced his atheism and become a Theist. He is agnostic about revelation and so he's not a Christian or a Muslim or a Jew. I have a slight claim to fame in that once upon a time I worked with his daughter .. anyway ...This interview is very interesting in unpicking some of the issues about beliving in God from a philosophical pov.
What I'm delighted to find is someone articulating something which I have found interesting and sometimes frustrating; that atheists tend to use an argument about evil negating God when actually the problem only exists if there is a God conceived of in fairly Christian terms, Iow they are arguing against God on the basis of something that is only possible in respect of a belief in God; otherwise there is no such thing as evil in the way they conceive. The term is only meaningful in a theistic context. This snippet of dialogue hints how ...
HABERMAS: In God and Philosophy, and in many other places in our discussions, too, it seems that your primary motivation for rejecting theistic arguments used to be the problem of evil. In terms of your new belief in God, how do you now conceptualise God’s relationship to the reality of evil in the world?
FLEW: Well, absent revelation, why should we perceive anything as objectively evil? The problem of evil is a problem only for Christians. For Muslims everything which human beings perceive as evil, just as much as everything we perceive as good, has to be obediently accepted as produced by the will of Allah. I suppose that the moment when, as a schoolboy of fifteen years, it first appeared to me that the thesis that the universe was created and is sustained by a Being of infinite power and goodness is flatly incompatible with the occurrence of massive undeniable and undenied evils in that universe, was the first step towards my future career as a philosopher! It was, of course, very much later that I learned of the philosophical identification of goodness with existence!
There are other things that Flew has to say that I think we should take on board: " I think those who want to speak about an afterlife have got to meet the difficulty of formulating a concept of an incorporeal person." Though this in fact makes room for Resurrection. I thinkm that Resurrection may well make far more sense in a culture where belief in an afterlife [presumably the floaty diembodied kind belived on spirtualists] is waning and there is an increasing sense of the bodiliness of human being. Of course Resurrection only works theistically, automatic immortality ain't on the menu in such a world. I've been saying for a number of years that my position as a Resurrection-believing Christian is far closer to the atheist position on afterlife than the popular mind realises.
For such a view NDE's [oh sorry; 'near death experiences'] can be interpreted as problematic. Listen in on how Flew handles it [and it is an issue for Christian orthodoxy too since a lot of NDE testimony is problematic for us].
HABERMAS: Actually you have also written to me that these near death experiences “certainly constitute impressive evidence for the possibility of the occurrence of human consciousness independent of any occurrences in the human brain.” (26)
FLEW: When I came to consider what seemed to me the most impressive of these near death cases I asked myself what is the traditional first question to ask about “psychic” phenomena. It is, “When, where, and by whom were the phenomena first reported?” Some people seem to confuse near death experiences with after death experiences. Where any such near death experiences become relevant to the question of a future life is when and only when they appear to show “the occurrence of human consciousness independent of any occurrences in the human brain.”
On a different tack, he has some interesting things to say in respect of Islam, and I think there is quite a lot to agree with in this: As for Islam, it is, I think, best described in a Marxian way as the uniting and justifying ideology of Arab imperialism. Between the New Testament and the Qur’an there is (as it is customary to say when making such comparisons) no comparison. Whereas markets can be found for books on reading the Bible as literature, to read the Qur’an is a penance rather than a pleasure. There is no order or development in its subject matter. All the chapters (the suras) are arranged in order of their length, with the longest at the beginning. However, since the Qur’an consists in a collection of bits and pieces of putative revelation delivered to the prophet Mohammad by the Archangel Gabriel in classical Arab on many separate but unknown occasions, it is difficult to suggest any superior principle of organization.
It's hard to deny the comparison, Flew is not by any means saying nice things about the NT, in context he is pretty unhappy with that as well. He is clearly still interested in the issues of how religions may calim merciful and compassionate views of God yet be so adamant about hell...
One point about the editing of the Qur’an is rarely made although it would appear to be of very substantial theological significance. For every sura is prefaced by the words “In the Name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate.” Yet there are references to Hell on at least 255 of the 669 pages of Arberry’s rendering of the Qur’an (34) and quite often pages have two such references.
There's also an interesting assesment of Muhammed:
Whereas St. Paul, who was the chief contributor to the New Testament, knew all the three relevant languages and obviously possessed a first class philosophical mind, the Prophet, though gifted in the arts of persuasion and clearly a considerable military leader, was both doubtfully literate and certainly ill-informed about the contents of the Old Testament and about several matters of which God, if not even the least informed of the Prophet’s contemporaries, must have been cognizant. Such remarks make him a little fearful for his future safety while giving some small comfort to Christians: This raises the possibility of what my philosophical contemporaries in the heyday of Gilbert Ryle would have described as a knock-down falsification of Islam: something which is most certainly not possible in the case of Christianity. If I do eventually produce such a paper it will obviously have to be published anonymously. Some comfort too in his closing remarks: LEW: Well, one thing I’ll say in this comparison is that, for goodness sake, Jesus is an enormously attractive charismatic figure, which the Prophet of Islam most emphatically is not.
Biola > Page 3 : Biola News & Communications
What I'm delighted to find is someone articulating something which I have found interesting and sometimes frustrating; that atheists tend to use an argument about evil negating God when actually the problem only exists if there is a God conceived of in fairly Christian terms, Iow they are arguing against God on the basis of something that is only possible in respect of a belief in God; otherwise there is no such thing as evil in the way they conceive. The term is only meaningful in a theistic context. This snippet of dialogue hints how ...
HABERMAS: In God and Philosophy, and in many other places in our discussions, too, it seems that your primary motivation for rejecting theistic arguments used to be the problem of evil. In terms of your new belief in God, how do you now conceptualise God’s relationship to the reality of evil in the world?
FLEW: Well, absent revelation, why should we perceive anything as objectively evil? The problem of evil is a problem only for Christians. For Muslims everything which human beings perceive as evil, just as much as everything we perceive as good, has to be obediently accepted as produced by the will of Allah. I suppose that the moment when, as a schoolboy of fifteen years, it first appeared to me that the thesis that the universe was created and is sustained by a Being of infinite power and goodness is flatly incompatible with the occurrence of massive undeniable and undenied evils in that universe, was the first step towards my future career as a philosopher! It was, of course, very much later that I learned of the philosophical identification of goodness with existence!
There are other things that Flew has to say that I think we should take on board: " I think those who want to speak about an afterlife have got to meet the difficulty of formulating a concept of an incorporeal person." Though this in fact makes room for Resurrection. I thinkm that Resurrection may well make far more sense in a culture where belief in an afterlife [presumably the floaty diembodied kind belived on spirtualists] is waning and there is an increasing sense of the bodiliness of human being. Of course Resurrection only works theistically, automatic immortality ain't on the menu in such a world. I've been saying for a number of years that my position as a Resurrection-believing Christian is far closer to the atheist position on afterlife than the popular mind realises.
For such a view NDE's [oh sorry; 'near death experiences'] can be interpreted as problematic. Listen in on how Flew handles it [and it is an issue for Christian orthodoxy too since a lot of NDE testimony is problematic for us].
HABERMAS: Actually you have also written to me that these near death experiences “certainly constitute impressive evidence for the possibility of the occurrence of human consciousness independent of any occurrences in the human brain.” (26)
FLEW: When I came to consider what seemed to me the most impressive of these near death cases I asked myself what is the traditional first question to ask about “psychic” phenomena. It is, “When, where, and by whom were the phenomena first reported?” Some people seem to confuse near death experiences with after death experiences. Where any such near death experiences become relevant to the question of a future life is when and only when they appear to show “the occurrence of human consciousness independent of any occurrences in the human brain.”
On a different tack, he has some interesting things to say in respect of Islam, and I think there is quite a lot to agree with in this: As for Islam, it is, I think, best described in a Marxian way as the uniting and justifying ideology of Arab imperialism. Between the New Testament and the Qur’an there is (as it is customary to say when making such comparisons) no comparison. Whereas markets can be found for books on reading the Bible as literature, to read the Qur’an is a penance rather than a pleasure. There is no order or development in its subject matter. All the chapters (the suras) are arranged in order of their length, with the longest at the beginning. However, since the Qur’an consists in a collection of bits and pieces of putative revelation delivered to the prophet Mohammad by the Archangel Gabriel in classical Arab on many separate but unknown occasions, it is difficult to suggest any superior principle of organization.
It's hard to deny the comparison, Flew is not by any means saying nice things about the NT, in context he is pretty unhappy with that as well. He is clearly still interested in the issues of how religions may calim merciful and compassionate views of God yet be so adamant about hell...
One point about the editing of the Qur’an is rarely made although it would appear to be of very substantial theological significance. For every sura is prefaced by the words “In the Name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate.” Yet there are references to Hell on at least 255 of the 669 pages of Arberry’s rendering of the Qur’an (34) and quite often pages have two such references.
There's also an interesting assesment of Muhammed:
Whereas St. Paul, who was the chief contributor to the New Testament, knew all the three relevant languages and obviously possessed a first class philosophical mind, the Prophet, though gifted in the arts of persuasion and clearly a considerable military leader, was both doubtfully literate and certainly ill-informed about the contents of the Old Testament and about several matters of which God, if not even the least informed of the Prophet’s contemporaries, must have been cognizant. Such remarks make him a little fearful for his future safety while giving some small comfort to Christians: This raises the possibility of what my philosophical contemporaries in the heyday of Gilbert Ryle would have described as a knock-down falsification of Islam: something which is most certainly not possible in the case of Christianity. If I do eventually produce such a paper it will obviously have to be published anonymously. Some comfort too in his closing remarks: LEW: Well, one thing I’ll say in this comparison is that, for goodness sake, Jesus is an enormously attractive charismatic figure, which the Prophet of Islam most emphatically is not.
Biola > Page 3 : Biola News & Communications
12 December 2004
Sub to this blog
Worth subbing to I suspect: a new climate blog dealing with myths and latest research on climate issues. Essential, I'd have thought, for any well-informed Christian.
Sub to this blog
Sub to this blog
RealClimate blog
Worth subbing to I suspect: a new climate blog dealing with myths and latest research on climate issues. Essential, I'd have thought, for any well-informed Christian.
RealClimate � Climate Science
RealClimate � Climate Science
3D street art
More from the Wooster lot: this one's a 3-d installation in Chicago -'project cleanup''. Nice.
Wooster Collective : Stickers / Posters / Graf / Culture Jamming
Wooster Collective : Stickers / Posters / Graf / Culture Jamming
11 December 2004
slide presentations -the rules
I've been meaning to write up my principels for presntations using software and data projectors. Since I use OO.o I can't bring myself to mention a certain power tool from M$ -what would be the point?
But Andrew Jones has saved me the trouble by blogging thusly:
"- i used only a few colors - a medium grey against white for the text was more subtle and seemed to work better than a shouting glaring black on white or, even worse, a tropical cheesy ecclesiastical PURPLE to match the church banners and flags (God forbid!)
- i never used bullets. I pretended they never existed.
- I changed the font from New Times to Helvetica
- i never used transitions, although i would have used a fade in/out if i had to.
- i placed a looping QT movie next to my text. Quicktime Pro is the program of choice. I downloaded some old footage of ant colonies and emergent cells, and exported it to a 320 x 240 QT using Photo-Jpeg compression of only 12 frames. That kept it really small. Of course the movies were primed to run and loop automatically so i didnt have to play with the presentation or push more buttons like a geeky scientist. I could also ignore the movies if i wanted to, since they were not synched chronologically with anything i was saying.
- my projected text was never the propositional point - no reason to parrot i am saying - it is soooo redundant!
- my text was either the title (first slide) or a bible verse that supported what i was saying. i would rather have people meditate on the source material (Proverbs in my case) than my processed thought drawn from the source. Another advantage of this is that i could change what i want to say on the spot without having to change the presentation.
- my text was written creatively - use of size and colors and placement to generate alternate shades of meaning.
- if i had more time, i could have saved the whole presentation as a QT movie for the CD [good feature]
- if i really wanted to show off, which i didnt, i could have used my bluetooth sony ericsson phone as a remote control with a cheap program i bought called Clicker."
I have a few variables and additional comments. I've tended to use pale yellow text on a black background using a deeper yellow to embolden text [liturgy -the bits we all say together for example]. However, this is only really advisable for dark viewing conditions [which is where most of my presentations have been for. I nearly always use a sans serif font [usually Arial, in my case] -it just looks nicer and I'm convinced it's easier to read [regardless of what the typographers say though not all]. I only use transitions occasionally when they seem to enhance the slide and then the preference is for fade: those jumping in and sliding way things are truly horrid most of the time. I'm less technical and have tended to use animated gif's for moving interest. I agree with the idea that simply repeating in the text what you are saying is too redundant for words. What I tend to do is use the slide text to guide us through the time together, they act like headings -in fact, usually, they cue up my next strophe since I tend not to work from detailed notes this helps me stick with the planned flow. Alternatively I throw in other material which supports or acts as a tease for what I'm saying or even sometimes interrogates or contradicts it! The point is to get several layers of communicationgoing and more than one message and learning style involved.
I loved too the Wired article on artists and powerpoint [darn, I wrote that word!]
TallSkinnyKiwi: The Skinny on Powerpoint:
But Andrew Jones has saved me the trouble by blogging thusly:
"- i used only a few colors - a medium grey against white for the text was more subtle and seemed to work better than a shouting glaring black on white or, even worse, a tropical cheesy ecclesiastical PURPLE to match the church banners and flags (God forbid!)
- i never used bullets. I pretended they never existed.
- I changed the font from New Times to Helvetica
- i never used transitions, although i would have used a fade in/out if i had to.
- i placed a looping QT movie next to my text. Quicktime Pro is the program of choice. I downloaded some old footage of ant colonies and emergent cells, and exported it to a 320 x 240 QT using Photo-Jpeg compression of only 12 frames. That kept it really small. Of course the movies were primed to run and loop automatically so i didnt have to play with the presentation or push more buttons like a geeky scientist. I could also ignore the movies if i wanted to, since they were not synched chronologically with anything i was saying.
- my projected text was never the propositional point - no reason to parrot i am saying - it is soooo redundant!
- my text was either the title (first slide) or a bible verse that supported what i was saying. i would rather have people meditate on the source material (Proverbs in my case) than my processed thought drawn from the source. Another advantage of this is that i could change what i want to say on the spot without having to change the presentation.
- my text was written creatively - use of size and colors and placement to generate alternate shades of meaning.
- if i had more time, i could have saved the whole presentation as a QT movie for the CD [good feature]
- if i really wanted to show off, which i didnt, i could have used my bluetooth sony ericsson phone as a remote control with a cheap program i bought called Clicker."
I have a few variables and additional comments. I've tended to use pale yellow text on a black background using a deeper yellow to embolden text [liturgy -the bits we all say together for example]. However, this is only really advisable for dark viewing conditions [which is where most of my presentations have been for. I nearly always use a sans serif font [usually Arial, in my case] -it just looks nicer and I'm convinced it's easier to read [regardless of what the typographers say though not all]. I only use transitions occasionally when they seem to enhance the slide and then the preference is for fade: those jumping in and sliding way things are truly horrid most of the time. I'm less technical and have tended to use animated gif's for moving interest. I agree with the idea that simply repeating in the text what you are saying is too redundant for words. What I tend to do is use the slide text to guide us through the time together, they act like headings -in fact, usually, they cue up my next strophe since I tend not to work from detailed notes this helps me stick with the planned flow. Alternatively I throw in other material which supports or acts as a tease for what I'm saying or even sometimes interrogates or contradicts it! The point is to get several layers of communicationgoing and more than one message and learning style involved.
I loved too the Wired article on artists and powerpoint [darn, I wrote that word!]
TallSkinnyKiwi: The Skinny on Powerpoint:
TV over internet
I have recently been pondering how come, with things like telephony heading down the internet, TV isn't? Just imagine, going to a menu and deciding to watch Babylon 5, or Friends repeats or News [and deciding what reports you watch, and when] ... just when you are ready. It's clear the tech is there. Interesting too that ten years ago Nicholas Negroponte was saying this and people were saying 'Okay wheres is this happening?' It now seems clear that the infrastructural issues were bigger that we suspected. Anyway this Wired article explores the issue a bit. What we need to note is that it is a further pressure towards personalisation and 'just for me' culture. It also akes interesting possibilities for ministry. Turn up for a visit about a Christening enquiry and pull down the preparation video and materials on the family's own IPTV ...
Wired 12.12: START
Wired 12.12: START
Christian rock
Brian Littrell, formerly of the Backstreet Boys has signed to Christian rock label Reunion Records and the Guardian online carries a slightly witty article about it which try as it might cant' quite managed to take the rip all the time and even gets to be grudgingly respectful at one or two points. Do check out the appaling lyrics link; it's gruesome.
My favourite comment was the last: "The good news about Brian fills us with hope. Maybe one day he'll fulfill a long-held desire of ours, and do a rock version of The Song of Solomon. 'A bundle of myrrh is my well-beloved unto me; he shall lie all night betwixt my breasts.' That Solomon, he really had Got It Going On."
Amen.
Guardian Unlimited | Today's issues | Christian rock:
"
My favourite comment was the last: "The good news about Brian fills us with hope. Maybe one day he'll fulfill a long-held desire of ours, and do a rock version of The Song of Solomon. 'A bundle of myrrh is my well-beloved unto me; he shall lie all night betwixt my breasts.' That Solomon, he really had Got It Going On."
Amen.
Guardian Unlimited | Today's issues | Christian rock:
"
'A better class of terrorist'
For a time, when I was at University, I used to live in the Basque country in Donostia [aka San Sebastian]. I learnt Basque ['Euskara'] and wrote a paper on Basque phonology and a dissertation on Basque grammar. I also hung around with various people, collected a rubber bullet and helped educate some fellow Brits about what I was discovering about Basque politics.
The thing I wanted to reflect on here is the place of religion in such things. In Britain we're used to associating religion with terrorism because of the way that the Irish troubles are commonly perceived. In Euskadi [=Basque homeland] this is not so. Both 'sides' are historically Roman Catholic. The phalangist Spanish state under Franco was Nationalist/fascist Catholic while the Basques are known to be,as a people, pretty loyal to the Church. Of course all this was complicated by the fact that the Republican side in the Spanish civil war had a big anti-clerical and anti-church animus and that was the side that supported regional autonomy whereas Franco's lot were into a centralised Catillian state. ETA itself has a history of Marxist influence and so it is pretty anti church [note that the article implies that the recently arrested leadership couple were living together without being married. Of course Spain has an even older history of interreligious conflict and the Madrid bombing must surely have had resonances of that since pageants involving and celebrating the expulsion of 'los moros' are still very much a part of the calendar in Spain ... It'd be interesting to see some analysis of that particularly in the light of the fact that the population of north Africans who are predominently Muslims -moros- now play such a key part in Spanish agriculture. I'm wondering whether ETA are playing the race and religion card, albeit subtly.
Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | 'A better class of terrorist'
The thing I wanted to reflect on here is the place of religion in such things. In Britain we're used to associating religion with terrorism because of the way that the Irish troubles are commonly perceived. In Euskadi [=Basque homeland] this is not so. Both 'sides' are historically Roman Catholic. The phalangist Spanish state under Franco was Nationalist/fascist Catholic while the Basques are known to be,as a people, pretty loyal to the Church. Of course all this was complicated by the fact that the Republican side in the Spanish civil war had a big anti-clerical and anti-church animus and that was the side that supported regional autonomy whereas Franco's lot were into a centralised Catillian state. ETA itself has a history of Marxist influence and so it is pretty anti church [note that the article implies that the recently arrested leadership couple were living together without being married. Of course Spain has an even older history of interreligious conflict and the Madrid bombing must surely have had resonances of that since pageants involving and celebrating the expulsion of 'los moros' are still very much a part of the calendar in Spain ... It'd be interesting to see some analysis of that particularly in the light of the fact that the population of north Africans who are predominently Muslims -moros- now play such a key part in Spanish agriculture. I'm wondering whether ETA are playing the race and religion card, albeit subtly.
Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | 'A better class of terrorist'
no room at the
I loved this storyesque exploration of 'no room at the inn'; a must for your preparation to hear or even preach on the Christmas stories.maggi dawn
10 December 2004
emerging church style sheets [3]
Thirdly I just had to include this extract because it was so helpful and inspiring to me. "An Emergent definition of relevance, modulated by resistance, might run something like this: relevance means listening before speaking; relevance means interpreting the culture to itself by noting the ways in which certain cultural productions gesture toward a transcendent grace and beauty; relevance means being ready to give an account for the hope that we have and being in places where someone might actually ask; relevance means believing that we might learn something from those who are most unlike us; relevance means not so much translating the church’s language to the culture as translating the culture’s language back to the church; relevance means making theological sense of the depth that people discover in the oddest places of ordinary living and then using that experience to draw them to the source of that depth (Augustine seems to imply such a move in his reflections on beauty and transience in his Confessions). Relevance might simply mean wanting to understand why so many young people have said that attending U2’s Elevation Tour and hearing Bono close the show with choruses of “Hallelujah” was like being in worship (but a whole lot better)."
It certainly expresses well what I think I have been trying to do in my involvement in alt.worship: to make connections that allow us to pray our culture and in so doing the hope is that people who pray our culture in a 'church' setting will pray it in everyday life too and that everyday life will become increasingly sacramental. The missional angle on this is that when life becomes sacramental to us we will evangelise without effort or without being under orders to do so; it will be simply our way of relating and it will make sense and be spiritually attractive to others. We make use of our cultural artefacts in worship not to make the church relevant to the culture but to equip Christians to pray our culture and so make Christians relevant to their neighbours in their culture.
I certainly think that part of the task of learning to pray our culture is to identify the points of resistance. A big theme for me has been to counter-claim and reclaim loyalty from brands to Christ in worship and to subvert the mindscape of advertising in our worship. I've not done this as much or as fully as I would like but I think it is a major task. A church that ignores advertising and brand-building is leaving its members prey to the Powers of this dark world.
the Christian Century
It certainly expresses well what I think I have been trying to do in my involvement in alt.worship: to make connections that allow us to pray our culture and in so doing the hope is that people who pray our culture in a 'church' setting will pray it in everyday life too and that everyday life will become increasingly sacramental. The missional angle on this is that when life becomes sacramental to us we will evangelise without effort or without being under orders to do so; it will be simply our way of relating and it will make sense and be spiritually attractive to others. We make use of our cultural artefacts in worship not to make the church relevant to the culture but to equip Christians to pray our culture and so make Christians relevant to their neighbours in their culture.
I certainly think that part of the task of learning to pray our culture is to identify the points of resistance. A big theme for me has been to counter-claim and reclaim loyalty from brands to Christ in worship and to subvert the mindscape of advertising in our worship. I've not done this as much or as fully as I would like but I think it is a major task. A church that ignores advertising and brand-building is leaving its members prey to the Powers of this dark world.
the Christian Century
emerging church style sheets [2]
Second off:
" This heavily lay-led movement tends to gravitate toward nondenominational, house church models disconnected from a larger body, both in terms of support and accountability. Such a view of the church suggests that modernity still has a foothold in this self-proclaimed “postmodern” conversation. In Emergent rhetoric one hears echoes of the Enlightenment-era suspicion of authority and the tendency toward privatizing and individualizing faith.
I'm troubled here by the analysis of modern and post-modern. I agree that the privatising and individualising aspect is probably more modernist than it is post-modern. Late modern perhaps, I think that is because at the moment our culture in that aspect is still in the modern phase and that is being reflected. However, what is significant, I think, is the networking style of connexionalism which is arguably post-modern and the valuing of other ways of knowing than simply the rational. The recognistion of multiple learning styles, the willingness to 'play', the incorporation of bodily practice all smack of post-medernism. At any moment any group culture will exhibit traits of what is past and fading, what is hot and happening and what is just developing, as well as things that are developing but will not be part of the future. So it is here. I think.
A lingering distrust of the “institutional church” has made partnership with mainline denominations difficult. For their part, mainline churches have generally failed to create space for new expressions of church to thrive." I suspect that hsi may be a USA thing and therefore, perhaps, something to do with the relative sense of 'sucess' that US church life has. In the UK it has been predominately the Church of England, I think, that has given space and freedomand sometime even resources to such churches. Admittedly there has been a robust dialogue at times and some adoloescent tantrums ... and yes a distrust of the institutions is ther, but then, most 'ordinary' CofE peple, in my experience, also distrust it! So nothing new there: we all make our accommodations, throw our toys out of the cot every so often and somehow get on with making things work. 'Making do' -that great cultural enterprise of the marginalised and the underdog; alive and well and living in a church near you.
" This heavily lay-led movement tends to gravitate toward nondenominational, house church models disconnected from a larger body, both in terms of support and accountability. Such a view of the church suggests that modernity still has a foothold in this self-proclaimed “postmodern” conversation. In Emergent rhetoric one hears echoes of the Enlightenment-era suspicion of authority and the tendency toward privatizing and individualizing faith.
I'm troubled here by the analysis of modern and post-modern. I agree that the privatising and individualising aspect is probably more modernist than it is post-modern. Late modern perhaps, I think that is because at the moment our culture in that aspect is still in the modern phase and that is being reflected. However, what is significant, I think, is the networking style of connexionalism which is arguably post-modern and the valuing of other ways of knowing than simply the rational. The recognistion of multiple learning styles, the willingness to 'play', the incorporation of bodily practice all smack of post-medernism. At any moment any group culture will exhibit traits of what is past and fading, what is hot and happening and what is just developing, as well as things that are developing but will not be part of the future. So it is here. I think.
A lingering distrust of the “institutional church” has made partnership with mainline denominations difficult. For their part, mainline churches have generally failed to create space for new expressions of church to thrive." I suspect that hsi may be a USA thing and therefore, perhaps, something to do with the relative sense of 'sucess' that US church life has. In the UK it has been predominately the Church of England, I think, that has given space and freedomand sometime even resources to such churches. Admittedly there has been a robust dialogue at times and some adoloescent tantrums ... and yes a distrust of the institutions is ther, but then, most 'ordinary' CofE peple, in my experience, also distrust it! So nothing new there: we all make our accommodations, throw our toys out of the cot every so often and somehow get on with making things work. 'Making do' -that great cultural enterprise of the marginalised and the underdog; alive and well and living in a church near you.
emerging church style sheets [1]
In this article ther is a really good overview of emerging church stuff and some good questions posed. Scott Bader-Saye, the author, raises some important issues andI'd like to reflect on some of them.
First off:
"Despite the undeniable power of these retrieved practices, one must wonder if the incense, candles, labyrinths and all the rest are being retrieved simply because they’ve become cool. Tangible, multisensory worship has a currency among younger generations, and this is all to the good. But if this recovery is linked only to generation and style, what will happen when styles change?"
I can't help feeling that this question is misconceived. It really seems to suppose that the interest in objects and a multisensory approach is a fad. I think that I want to argue that it is both more than a fad and that it has been to some degree theologised over [at least in alt.Worship circles which is where I am writing from]. But before I explain those further I think it is only fair to note also that such 'fads' were part of the church scene already and have been for centuries and that I take issues with the implicit norming of post enlightenmnet western Christianity's cerebralisation of spiritual practice, which again seems to underly the question. Perhaps it would be unfair to ask of this 'movement' soemthing that we don't also ask of others? Or at least offer the same critique. As it is part of the point is that the fads of modernist church are being recognised for what they are and the recovery of embodied and sensory elements is part of re-indiginising.
It is more than a fad because it is based in real cultural changes that are more than simply fashionable. We only have to take note of the turn to embodiment in psychology, medicine, philosophy and science to realise that the widening of what is valued about being human beyond the rational is taking place driven by scientific advances in understanding brain function and a turn also to a more holistic approach to life the universe and everything more generally, fed and nurtured by sciences of complexity and emergence. The somatic dimension of human being is here to stay in our cultural thinking for some time to come. It is true that just how this bodiliness is may vary but the underlying trend is likely to be around for some time.
And from the point of view of Christian theology the whole thing is reasonably well-founded too. It is based in incarnation which as a theme relates both to the project of inculturation and more pointedly to the recovered valuing of embodiment that I have just identified as a growing 'meme' in our culture. Part of that -as in more catholic theologies- is an appreciation of the use of the physical [and not just books] and ritual in corporate and personal worship.
There is a further protestant objection to this turn which is based in the suspicion of ritual and the physical on the basis of concerns about idolatry and compromising the mediatorship of Christ. I would love to tarry a while on that issue both as a linguist and a theologian, but it is beyond the scope of this little foray.
“I think the major problem is that you may be rediscovering the ancient as a new gimmick,” comments Webber. “If you don’t do the theological thinking that stands behind liturgy and sacrament and all the kinds of things that are part and parcel of the classical tradition, this will just fade out. It will have no staying power. The next generation is going to come along and do something different.”
Two things: at least some of us have been doing that thinking and we too are concerned tht some of what we are seeing may simply be 'me-too' style which is bolting on to a fundamentally unsympathetic and unreconstructed theology. Be that as it may, I think that there are enough around who are theologically and culturally well enough rooted for it to be more than a flash in the pan. However there is another part of me that is saying: "Why shouldn't the next generation do something different? Why are we looking to set up stuff to last for centuries when we're in a culture where these kinds of things just don't [last for eons]?" Is that a contradiction? No, paradoxical perhaps: the underlying cultural trend values embodiment, however the form that it will take may vary. And if it changed next generation then we'd have to respond to that as Christians ... what's the problem; that's what 'incarnation' -better inculturation- is about. Get over it.
"If a practice is reintroduced simply because it meets the needs or desires of a generation, it will only reinforce the modern penchant for novelty. One test for the emerging church will be whether ancient practices are retrieved as practices or simply as preferences" So we're seeting up the alleged penchant for novelty against a putative penchant for continuity? Is that what is being said? Surely the practices should serve the spiritual growth of the worshipper not the worshipper the practice [shades of what the purpose of sabbath is, I think]? The test isn't whether they are practices or preferences but whether people grow spiritually through them however long-lasting or temporary they might be in the life of the worshipper. perhaps that is waht is meant by contrasting practices with preferences? Dilettantism is a spiritual danger, to be sure, but only because it is an attitude that expects or looks for something that is not in the nature of the thing grasped and that is not just a danger for emergers.
Some of this criticism starts to sound like grumpy old men who've developed a theological vocabularly and aren't afraid to use it ... so I say: step away from the argument and apply it to your own traditions first, because for many of us serious about this stuff, that's where we started from.
the Christian Century
First off:
"Despite the undeniable power of these retrieved practices, one must wonder if the incense, candles, labyrinths and all the rest are being retrieved simply because they’ve become cool. Tangible, multisensory worship has a currency among younger generations, and this is all to the good. But if this recovery is linked only to generation and style, what will happen when styles change?"
I can't help feeling that this question is misconceived. It really seems to suppose that the interest in objects and a multisensory approach is a fad. I think that I want to argue that it is both more than a fad and that it has been to some degree theologised over [at least in alt.Worship circles which is where I am writing from]. But before I explain those further I think it is only fair to note also that such 'fads' were part of the church scene already and have been for centuries and that I take issues with the implicit norming of post enlightenmnet western Christianity's cerebralisation of spiritual practice, which again seems to underly the question. Perhaps it would be unfair to ask of this 'movement' soemthing that we don't also ask of others? Or at least offer the same critique. As it is part of the point is that the fads of modernist church are being recognised for what they are and the recovery of embodied and sensory elements is part of re-indiginising.
It is more than a fad because it is based in real cultural changes that are more than simply fashionable. We only have to take note of the turn to embodiment in psychology, medicine, philosophy and science to realise that the widening of what is valued about being human beyond the rational is taking place driven by scientific advances in understanding brain function and a turn also to a more holistic approach to life the universe and everything more generally, fed and nurtured by sciences of complexity and emergence. The somatic dimension of human being is here to stay in our cultural thinking for some time to come. It is true that just how this bodiliness is may vary but the underlying trend is likely to be around for some time.
And from the point of view of Christian theology the whole thing is reasonably well-founded too. It is based in incarnation which as a theme relates both to the project of inculturation and more pointedly to the recovered valuing of embodiment that I have just identified as a growing 'meme' in our culture. Part of that -as in more catholic theologies- is an appreciation of the use of the physical [and not just books] and ritual in corporate and personal worship.
There is a further protestant objection to this turn which is based in the suspicion of ritual and the physical on the basis of concerns about idolatry and compromising the mediatorship of Christ. I would love to tarry a while on that issue both as a linguist and a theologian, but it is beyond the scope of this little foray.
“I think the major problem is that you may be rediscovering the ancient as a new gimmick,” comments Webber. “If you don’t do the theological thinking that stands behind liturgy and sacrament and all the kinds of things that are part and parcel of the classical tradition, this will just fade out. It will have no staying power. The next generation is going to come along and do something different.”
Two things: at least some of us have been doing that thinking and we too are concerned tht some of what we are seeing may simply be 'me-too' style which is bolting on to a fundamentally unsympathetic and unreconstructed theology. Be that as it may, I think that there are enough around who are theologically and culturally well enough rooted for it to be more than a flash in the pan. However there is another part of me that is saying: "Why shouldn't the next generation do something different? Why are we looking to set up stuff to last for centuries when we're in a culture where these kinds of things just don't [last for eons]?" Is that a contradiction? No, paradoxical perhaps: the underlying cultural trend values embodiment, however the form that it will take may vary. And if it changed next generation then we'd have to respond to that as Christians ... what's the problem; that's what 'incarnation' -better inculturation- is about. Get over it.
"If a practice is reintroduced simply because it meets the needs or desires of a generation, it will only reinforce the modern penchant for novelty. One test for the emerging church will be whether ancient practices are retrieved as practices or simply as preferences" So we're seeting up the alleged penchant for novelty against a putative penchant for continuity? Is that what is being said? Surely the practices should serve the spiritual growth of the worshipper not the worshipper the practice [shades of what the purpose of sabbath is, I think]? The test isn't whether they are practices or preferences but whether people grow spiritually through them however long-lasting or temporary they might be in the life of the worshipper. perhaps that is waht is meant by contrasting practices with preferences? Dilettantism is a spiritual danger, to be sure, but only because it is an attitude that expects or looks for something that is not in the nature of the thing grasped and that is not just a danger for emergers.
Some of this criticism starts to sound like grumpy old men who've developed a theological vocabularly and aren't afraid to use it ... so I say: step away from the argument and apply it to your own traditions first, because for many of us serious about this stuff, that's where we started from.
the Christian Century
09 December 2004
effects of gaming
These things all deserve consideration and response from thoughtful Christians.
" How are these virtual worlds/games impacting daily life? Consider the following fascinating MASTER OF THE YOUNIVERSE learnings:
• In games, the individual is always the star. Which then translates to gamers expecting to be a star in the real world, in daily life, in the workforce, wanting to lead and to stand out.
• In games, there's always a solution, gamers just have to find it. Pounding on a problem until it gets solved may then translate into more persistence and optimism when not behind the console as well.
• In games, failure is part of success. Anyone who tries a new game fails multiple times before getting it right, so the Gamer Generation is more willing to take risks. (Sources: USA TODAY and 'Got Game', by John Beck and Mitchell Wade.)"
I hadn't considered as closely as perhaps I should this trend, though Michael Moynagh picks it up as 'just for you' personalisation. What does this mean for church /Christian mission?
Well the advice to sellers is "Only solution to avoid total commoditization in a MASTER OF THE YOUNIVERSE world: to be unique, one of a kind, to let the customer personalize, customize or even better co-create with you your goods, services, processes and experiences."
Which is what alt.worship is about to some extent, the co-creator insight is important, the more so since there is something in that about the image of God ... Cell church is also picking up on it to some degree.
TRENDWATCHING.COM Newsletter | Global Consumer and Marketing Trends | December 2004
" How are these virtual worlds/games impacting daily life? Consider the following fascinating MASTER OF THE YOUNIVERSE learnings:
• In games, the individual is always the star. Which then translates to gamers expecting to be a star in the real world, in daily life, in the workforce, wanting to lead and to stand out.
• In games, there's always a solution, gamers just have to find it. Pounding on a problem until it gets solved may then translate into more persistence and optimism when not behind the console as well.
• In games, failure is part of success. Anyone who tries a new game fails multiple times before getting it right, so the Gamer Generation is more willing to take risks. (Sources: USA TODAY and 'Got Game', by John Beck and Mitchell Wade.)"
I hadn't considered as closely as perhaps I should this trend, though Michael Moynagh picks it up as 'just for you' personalisation. What does this mean for church /Christian mission?
Well the advice to sellers is "Only solution to avoid total commoditization in a MASTER OF THE YOUNIVERSE world: to be unique, one of a kind, to let the customer personalize, customize or even better co-create with you your goods, services, processes and experiences."
Which is what alt.worship is about to some extent, the co-creator insight is important, the more so since there is something in that about the image of God ... Cell church is also picking up on it to some degree.
TRENDWATCHING.COM Newsletter | Global Consumer and Marketing Trends | December 2004
Fully-gifted creation
A little while ago I blogged about creation saying that I didn't see that God creating through a process that might show up as evolutionary was very different from the claim that 'God made me' even though quite clearly I was generated by my parents' genetic material in suitable biological conditions. It will be no surprise to find this view elsewhere:
"He said he called this approach the “fully-gifted Creation” perspective, meaning that God created the universe out of nothing, and provided it with all of the resources required to make its evolutionary development possible. If that sounds too formal or difficult to remember, just think of it as the Right Stuff Universe Principle,” said Van Till. “The universe has the ‘right stuff’ to make the natural evolution of atoms, stars, starfish and human stargazers possible.” [note this isn't Cornelius Van Til!] Anyway pretty compatible with what I wrote. But then we have to reckon with this:
"Conservative Christian critics were skeptical, said Van Till, and considered his approach deist"
And you can see why, it seems to say God put it all together at the beginning and is just letting things unfold. However, that is not necessarily what is being claimed for the view. The fatal flaw, it seems to me, in that objection is that it seems somehow to see God as inside time [which is problematic since time is surely a created 'elemental' St.Augustine among others made a convincing case for the createdness of time which Einstein kind of supports]. If God is outside, in some important ways, of our space-time continuum, then the flow of time from which we make this judgement is hardly the point. God creates all, including the developmental processes fromstart to finish. The fact that God chooses to include some reflexivity in the processes [which make complexity, emergence, and human free will possible within the flow] simply complicates things for us but means we are here to debate it. Anyway, all of space time sits within God's creative nurturance even the developments. This shows up in the form of Van Till's further riposte: "He also pointed out that God’s continuing action of sustaining is as essential as His action of creating in the first place."
What I'm saying is that there really isn't much if any difference between the creative act and the sustaining of creation, they both proceed from the same will and act of God.
Now if you want to make it really complicated try to work out how God can will something to happen when God is outside of time ...
"He said he called this approach the “fully-gifted Creation” perspective, meaning that God created the universe out of nothing, and provided it with all of the resources required to make its evolutionary development possible. If that sounds too formal or difficult to remember, just think of it as the Right Stuff Universe Principle,” said Van Till. “The universe has the ‘right stuff’ to make the natural evolution of atoms, stars, starfish and human stargazers possible.” [note this isn't Cornelius Van Til!] Anyway pretty compatible with what I wrote. But then we have to reckon with this:
"Conservative Christian critics were skeptical, said Van Till, and considered his approach deist"
And you can see why, it seems to say God put it all together at the beginning and is just letting things unfold. However, that is not necessarily what is being claimed for the view. The fatal flaw, it seems to me, in that objection is that it seems somehow to see God as inside time [which is problematic since time is surely a created 'elemental' St.Augustine among others made a convincing case for the createdness of time which Einstein kind of supports]. If God is outside, in some important ways, of our space-time continuum, then the flow of time from which we make this judgement is hardly the point. God creates all, including the developmental processes fromstart to finish. The fact that God chooses to include some reflexivity in the processes [which make complexity, emergence, and human free will possible within the flow] simply complicates things for us but means we are here to debate it. Anyway, all of space time sits within God's creative nurturance even the developments. This shows up in the form of Van Till's further riposte: "He also pointed out that God’s continuing action of sustaining is as essential as His action of creating in the first place."
What I'm saying is that there really isn't much if any difference between the creative act and the sustaining of creation, they both proceed from the same will and act of God.
Now if you want to make it really complicated try to work out how God can will something to happen when God is outside of time ...
Christmas trees
What is the best option on trees, artificial or real well it's almost settled by "Remember: no on vinyl, and that's final. We are boycotting vinyl to the greatest extent possible, people." -but not quite settled as you will see when you read on ....On Christmas trees | By Umbra Fisk | Grist Magazine | Ask Umbra | 08 Dec 2004:
Deicide dropped
Yep: apparently the killing of god has been toned down in the film they're making of His Dark Materials. It's because they're worried that it might stir up a negative reaction in a huge potential audience [let the reader understand]. Personally I don't have a problem with it as it stands since the god that dies is clearly not the creator and sustainer of all being but some jumped up power who is clearly a created being. Anyway, the interesting thing [given Pullman's testy reactions in his Third Way interview [you'll need to do a search on their site "Pullman" did it for me] is that Pullman is quite happy with a broader interpretation of the Authority "as representing any repressive establishment, be it political, totalitarian, fundamental or communist, gave him a wide licence when it came to depicting the character on screen." Quite so, and 'repressive' isn't one of the names of the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ; mistaken identity if anyone thinks so ...
Guardian Unlimited Film | News | Deicide dropped from Pullman adaptation:
Guardian Unlimited Film | News | Deicide dropped from Pullman adaptation:
Return to the Age of Sail?
"While there is something superficially absurd about massive cargo ships being pulled along by kites, upon reflection the notion makes sense. It's a novel form of 'hybrid' power, taking advantage of strengths of diverse propulsion systems: the consistency of diesel engines and the free availability and startling strength of wind power"
WorldChanging: Another World Is Here: A Return to the Age of Sail?:
WorldChanging: Another World Is Here: A Return to the Age of Sail?:
Street art
Just subbed to the feed for this site that daily updates round the world street art
eg
Have a look, and sub too for your daily dose of admiring form, colour and people's creativity.
Wooster Collective : Stickers / Posters / Graf / Culture Jamming
eg
Have a look, and sub too for your daily dose of admiring form, colour and people's creativity.
Wooster Collective : Stickers / Posters / Graf / Culture Jamming
Browser Vulnerability Test
This is worrying, especially as we had got used to thinking that firefox wasn't likely to be vulnerable to stuff like this. If you want to test your browser, check this out. If you don't want to worry just ignore this. The advice is "Do not browse untrusted sites while browsing trusted sites."
I think that means if you're online banking or buying something online, make sure that you only have one tab or one browser window open at a time for the duration of your secure transaction. Or it may not be secure after all.
Secunia - Multiple Browsers Window Injection Vulnerability Test
I think that means if you're online banking or buying something online, make sure that you only have one tab or one browser window open at a time for the duration of your secure transaction. Or it may not be secure after all.
Secunia - Multiple Browsers Window Injection Vulnerability Test
08 December 2004
Neurotheology
Still on the theme of biological effects or affects of spirituality and faith.
“The point has to be made that spiritual experience is intrinsic to human nature,” Winkelman said. “The people at this conference are looking at the physiological and physical manifestations of spirituality to develop the scientific framework that will eventually answer the question: What is it about our physical selves that makes the spirit so much a part of our being?”
The article has a qquick romp through some of the issues in neurotheology, though not very informatively in the end as I had hoped. I do think, however, that the issue of how God [or whatever] would interact withus raises the question of how that might or might not show up in brain scans or anything else. This is very much territory where our old friend the god-of-the-gaps could put in appearance and I wondered whether the discussion about quantum indeterminacy was just such an appearance. I think that some of the issues probably relates to how we conceptualise bottom-up causality and top-down causality ... but that is a matter for another time when I've had more opportunity to think further; but your ideas by all means....
Also see this article.
Science & Theology News - Research Reports: Neurotheologians convene at Kansas City conference
“The point has to be made that spiritual experience is intrinsic to human nature,” Winkelman said. “The people at this conference are looking at the physiological and physical manifestations of spirituality to develop the scientific framework that will eventually answer the question: What is it about our physical selves that makes the spirit so much a part of our being?”
The article has a qquick romp through some of the issues in neurotheology, though not very informatively in the end as I had hoped. I do think, however, that the issue of how God [or whatever] would interact withus raises the question of how that might or might not show up in brain scans or anything else. This is very much territory where our old friend the god-of-the-gaps could put in appearance and I wondered whether the discussion about quantum indeterminacy was just such an appearance. I think that some of the issues probably relates to how we conceptualise bottom-up causality and top-down causality ... but that is a matter for another time when I've had more opportunity to think further; but your ideas by all means....
Also see this article.
Science & Theology News - Research Reports: Neurotheologians convene at Kansas City conference
Churchgoing is healthy
It's true apparently -but not news. In fact one of the difficult consequences is that the Church of England has a pensions crisis caused by the actuarial fact that retired clergy tend to live longer on average than most other sectors of the population ... see previous blog entry for a refference to the possible survival value of faith as a potentially genetic fact.
Make of this waht you will, and there are certainly more questions many will have about the basic data and just what causal factors there are. While no doubt some will want to talk in terms of supernatural providence most will be more comfortable with thinking in terms of faith enabling us to be secure and to work withing the grain of what we are made for and in terms of greater serenity and thus lower stress-related illness rates, etc etc.
Science & Theology News - Research Reports: Biological link between health and religious service attendance
Make of this waht you will, and there are certainly more questions many will have about the basic data and just what causal factors there are. While no doubt some will want to talk in terms of supernatural providence most will be more comfortable with thinking in terms of faith enabling us to be secure and to work withing the grain of what we are made for and in terms of greater serenity and thus lower stress-related illness rates, etc etc.
Science & Theology News - Research Reports: Biological link between health and religious service attendance
God in the genes
"In The God Gene, Hamer suggests that the propensity for spirituality is a human survival trait that gets passed on through the genes. That the spiritual person has good health is part of that survival, Hamer said in his lecture."
It's interesting because the guy who is saying this doesn't seem to be into reductionism: ie he's not saying that because he thinks there is a genetic predisposition to faith, that faith is just an expression of a gene and has no reality. In fact one might actually be able to argue the reverse; since adaptttions better equip an organism to deal with its reality ...
:
see also http://www.stnews.org/edit_could_1204.html
It's interesting because the guy who is saying this doesn't seem to be into reductionism: ie he's not saying that because he thinks there is a genetic predisposition to faith, that faith is just an expression of a gene and has no reality. In fact one might actually be able to argue the reverse; since adaptttions better equip an organism to deal with its reality ...
:
see also http://www.stnews.org/edit_could_1204.html
noddy guide to premillenialism
right click the image to get to the option to see it full sized. I link it here not because I believe in it and want to present it for you to beleive in too but so that you have the chance to have a reference point in case you need to keep in view what it is that this group of people do believe. I still feel that JEsus' agnosticism about such things is fatal to this view and I still beleive that a view which essentially sees the book of Revelation as apocalyptic literature, ie as revealing what the spiritual dynamics of history are [and were for Christians in the first century]. If you want to know more you could do worse than copnsult Michael Wilcox's commentary published by IVP in the Bible Speaks Today series.
Blue Letter Bible
Hydrogen Economy for beginners
A good introductory piece with some useful further reading links. It does a good job of recognising the difficulties still to be overcome. There are signs that some of them are really being dealt with but as of now nothing is working and then there are the issues of scaling and the rapidity of the same. also worth looking at the comments after the article.
altPVC
"The photovoltaic cell is old news. The latest way to exploit the sun is through tiny materials that can directly convert sunlight into large amounts of hydrogen."
Basically these new nanotech-based hydrogen bearing cells can produce hydrogen very much more cheaply with scalability. It wouold be a decentralised source of hydrogen power [and once the idea of brew your own gets off the ground it muist be a winner].
There are problems; corrosion is one and improving the efficiency for extensive usage is another, although at 10% efficiency ther are cheaper already in production costs.
Basically these new nanotech-based hydrogen bearing cells can produce hydrogen very much more cheaply with scalability. It wouold be a decentralised source of hydrogen power [and once the idea of brew your own gets off the ground it muist be a winner].
There are problems; corrosion is one and improving the efficiency for extensive usage is another, although at 10% efficiency ther are cheaper already in production costs.
video webcasting and worship
This looks interesting in what it may be able to do for the possibilities of video in alt.worship events. It just looks like it may be getting easier to set up stuff. The interesting thing would be if the actual viewing points become more personal and the possibilities that this opens up. It also has the potential to increase isolation. Now I recognise that giving individuals their space can be a big attraction of alt.worship. On the other hand I am concerned about the potential loss of corporateness. I know when I am involved in leading this kind of worship, I tend to go into trainer mode, somewhat, and build in group exercises and the like just so that we retain the corporateness which I treally do think is theoogically demanded of us both in terms of the image of God and also the 'discerning of the body'. I also think that it is an important countercultural marker which over the next few years is likely to be less countercultural as integralist mindsets become more embedded. Th issues is how we balance the individual and the corporate.
I think that there is a lot of nonsense said and written about this. The actual fact is that there is almost always some kind of balance and trade-off between them. Some criticise modern worship songs for their slushy individualism [and there is a great deal to affirm in that critique], however it is interesting that they are usually dependent on a large crowd to gain their full emotional impact; the feelings invoked [or possibly created?] by them and poured into worship are often generated or power-assisted by the corporate context. It's one reason why music is so important in lots of contemporary worship: it does a fine job of syncing individuals particularly at an emotional level. I note that the NT has more to say about breaking bread together than singing together, yet we have, in practice, reversed that.
On the other hand it is also often the case that some ideological corporate worship events -such as a catholic mass, can be among the most isolating of the individual in practice.
The truth of the matter is that as beings who image God we reflect both the diversity and the unity; the personhood and the community impulses. What we, alternative, 'normal and emerging church, need to do is to be aware of these and to prepare for worship with them both in mind and with an eye to the blance between them.
I think that there is a lot of nonsense said and written about this. The actual fact is that there is almost always some kind of balance and trade-off between them. Some criticise modern worship songs for their slushy individualism [and there is a great deal to affirm in that critique], however it is interesting that they are usually dependent on a large crowd to gain their full emotional impact; the feelings invoked [or possibly created?] by them and poured into worship are often generated or power-assisted by the corporate context. It's one reason why music is so important in lots of contemporary worship: it does a fine job of syncing individuals particularly at an emotional level. I note that the NT has more to say about breaking bread together than singing together, yet we have, in practice, reversed that.
On the other hand it is also often the case that some ideological corporate worship events -such as a catholic mass, can be among the most isolating of the individual in practice.
The truth of the matter is that as beings who image God we reflect both the diversity and the unity; the personhood and the community impulses. What we, alternative, 'normal and emerging church, need to do is to be aware of these and to prepare for worship with them both in mind and with an eye to the blance between them.
Chaos=cooperation?
This is a fascinating study in how anarchy can work through giving responsibility and relying on people's desire to protect themselves and optimise their chances. The paradoxical thing is that by making road junctions apparently more dangerous, they, in fact, become safer. this seems to be a kind of indicator of the wisdom of crowds in appropriate conditions.
Good games guide
I've always been a bit of a fan of board games [how deeply uncool is that?] The exception is Monopoly -it's so dispiriting once you start to lose because there really is no way to beat the snowball effect of increasing wealth -which was the educational point of the game, I understand. The only way I found to make it variable was a tweak of the rules allowing the banker to tax income or transactions which led me to a happy hour or so trying to redistribute income and come up with a progressive tax regime, much more interesting.
Anyway, this kind of a web page is really good; what games are out there? Well there are these and there is a link to further resources. Remember Civ started as a rather good board game ...
The Morning News - The 2004 Good Gift Games Guide
Anyway, this kind of a web page is really good; what games are out there? Well there are these and there is a link to further resources. Remember Civ started as a rather good board game ...
The Morning News - The 2004 Good Gift Games Guide
Florida voting still under the spotlight
This seems like a worrying thing, especially if it was actually done. It certainly means that we need to be careful when we investigate electronic voting.
"the 46-year-old programmer says he was instructed by then-Republican state representative Tom Feeney to “develop a prototype of a voting program that could alter the vote tabulation in the election and be undetectable.”
"the 46-year-old programmer says he was instructed by then-Republican state representative Tom Feeney to “develop a prototype of a voting program that could alter the vote tabulation in the election and be undetectable.”
Left handedness=better spatial memory?
This is yet further data to put with all that stuff about left and right brain and evolutionary biology. The jjury is still out, but studying chimpanzee brain and comparing them with humans seesm to be helping progress; it now looks like language is not wspecially implicated in left- or right- handedness, if chimps are anything to go by. It'll probably feed even more of those pop science and mysticism ideas about being left or right brained.
07 December 2004
I'll huff and I'll puff...
A cardboard house -okay it's meant to be temporary -but how long might it last. It has good environmental credentials. I note it's Australian, wonder how well it'd work in British climate? How do they keep it waterproof?
Houses of the Future
ADHD without tears
Something to keep an eye on, not least because it appears to work and to be scientifically documented as working. The other part of the treatment needs to be noted and thought about carefully: "it is about awakening energy channels through exercises not too dissimilar from chi kung.". Now this is the bit that has not been scientifically ascertained and I'm cross that a speculative metaphysical 'explanation' is being given in close association with scientifically tested practice as if the one carries over to the other. I am a 'chi-skeptic'. I'm not at all convinced by this energy channel stuff. It seems to me that because something works doesn't endorse any particular explanation; after all the Ptolemaic system of astronomy was an explanation that worked; but not the best. Illusionist and mentalists imply an explanation of their apparent powers that is not at all what they are doing in fact.
Just because this seems to work doesn't mean we have to take the expalnation offered on board. It's acutally an atitude Christians ought to take about a whole host of complementary therapies, I think.
Of course we need to be aware of the likely cultural impact in a society that is already more than ever open to 'spirituality' but not Christianity. The success will be read as a proof of the 'chi' idea which will strengthen certain eastern approaches to spirituality. In turn this means that we will need to be able to explain how 'chi' does or doesn't fit with Christian faith [and I suspect that identifying it with the Holy Spirit -which is what some people will bid for- is not helpful].
Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | It works ...!
Just because this seems to work doesn't mean we have to take the expalnation offered on board. It's acutally an atitude Christians ought to take about a whole host of complementary therapies, I think.
Of course we need to be aware of the likely cultural impact in a society that is already more than ever open to 'spirituality' but not Christianity. The success will be read as a proof of the 'chi' idea which will strengthen certain eastern approaches to spirituality. In turn this means that we will need to be able to explain how 'chi' does or doesn't fit with Christian faith [and I suspect that identifying it with the Holy Spirit -which is what some people will bid for- is not helpful].
Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | It works ...!
Global Warming = Ice Age?
It was a theory -captured dramatically in the film 'The Day after Tomorrow'. Now it may be confirmed by 'historical' data ...
Planet Ark : How Global Warming Can Lead To A Big Chill
Planet Ark : How Global Warming Can Lead To A Big Chill
06 December 2004
Reinventing marriage by stealth?
I find this interesting: the idea that people should draw up cohabitation contracts. Why should this be done? Surely the point of living together is to avoid all that legal red-tape and all that straight married with two kids stuff? After all what's a bit of paper?
A spokeswoman for the Living Together campaign said the agreements were not just for relationships that failed but also helped couples "promote a peace of mind and security at having their finances organised". The agreements can also take in daily financial matters such as food bills.
I applaud this: it is recognising that the good health of relationships needs good support which is wired into wider society. IT may not be quite marraige as we had got used to it but its pretty close to marriage as it's come to be. Now all we have to do is begin to make the case plausibly that to enter such a relationship with an implicit get out clause is ultiumately liekly to proove corrosive and we have something pretty close to a Christian understanding of marriage, I think. It evolved partly because it works, over time. It may not be perfect and there are going to be hard cases but hard cases make bad law.
When it was reported on BBC breakfast this morning one couple were asked why not just get married, and it was interesting that their answer was pretty weak; a kind of gentle splutter that people live together nowadays and it was sensible to do this kind of thing. In other words marriage has informalised.
I reckon all we've really got to beat now is this meme about the necessity of multi-millial pound wedding and we can talk about the real stuff of relationships, commitment, love, security, God and blessing ...
Guardian Unlimited | The Guardian | Agreements to aid de facto 'divorce'
A spokeswoman for the Living Together campaign said the agreements were not just for relationships that failed but also helped couples "promote a peace of mind and security at having their finances organised". The agreements can also take in daily financial matters such as food bills.
I applaud this: it is recognising that the good health of relationships needs good support which is wired into wider society. IT may not be quite marraige as we had got used to it but its pretty close to marriage as it's come to be. Now all we have to do is begin to make the case plausibly that to enter such a relationship with an implicit get out clause is ultiumately liekly to proove corrosive and we have something pretty close to a Christian understanding of marriage, I think. It evolved partly because it works, over time. It may not be perfect and there are going to be hard cases but hard cases make bad law.
When it was reported on BBC breakfast this morning one couple were asked why not just get married, and it was interesting that their answer was pretty weak; a kind of gentle splutter that people live together nowadays and it was sensible to do this kind of thing. In other words marriage has informalised.
I reckon all we've really got to beat now is this meme about the necessity of multi-millial pound wedding and we can talk about the real stuff of relationships, commitment, love, security, God and blessing ...
Guardian Unlimited | The Guardian | Agreements to aid de facto 'divorce'
Incitement to religious hatred
I must admit that I have been wondering whether there is anything to worry about or not in this proposed bill which gets its third reading shortly. On th eone hand I am all for closing down organisations that espouse and promote hatred based on religion, in line with other kinds of hate promotion activities. On the other hand I'm concerned that some relisious groups take themselves as fallible human organisations way too seriously and try to hide from legitimate questioning and criticism. So I think I was mollified by this:
"A Home Office spokeswoman defended the bill, insisting it would not interfere with the right to free speech. 'There is a clear difference between criticism of a religion and the act of inciting hatred against members of a religious group,' she said. 'The incitement offences have a high criminal threshold and prosecutions require the consent of the attorney general. There has not been a widespread sense that the existing offence has interfered with free speech and we are confident that an offence of incitement to religious hatred will not do so either.'"
At stake is the issue'; may I, as a Christian, make a legitimate criticism of, -for example- Muhammed based on my reading of evidence to say that I do not beleive that he was given revelations by God to behead his enemies or to marry Aisha when she was 9 years old and he already had wives ... or that the Qur'an is clearly not the word of God in the way that some Muslims apprently believe because it contains factual errors.
I am incidently quite happy for other to make similar kinds of remarks about Christian faith because I beleive that it is best to have this stuff out in the open and for Christians to try to take up the challenges to faith and meet them not to surpress them.
The issue is can we do this under this new proposed legislation?
Guardian Unlimited Politics | Special Reports | Tories not amused by Blunkett's bill:
"A Home Office spokeswoman defended the bill, insisting it would not interfere with the right to free speech. 'There is a clear difference between criticism of a religion and the act of inciting hatred against members of a religious group,' she said. 'The incitement offences have a high criminal threshold and prosecutions require the consent of the attorney general. There has not been a widespread sense that the existing offence has interfered with free speech and we are confident that an offence of incitement to religious hatred will not do so either.'"
At stake is the issue'; may I, as a Christian, make a legitimate criticism of, -for example- Muhammed based on my reading of evidence to say that I do not beleive that he was given revelations by God to behead his enemies or to marry Aisha when she was 9 years old and he already had wives ... or that the Qur'an is clearly not the word of God in the way that some Muslims apprently believe because it contains factual errors.
I am incidently quite happy for other to make similar kinds of remarks about Christian faith because I beleive that it is best to have this stuff out in the open and for Christians to try to take up the challenges to faith and meet them not to surpress them.
The issue is can we do this under this new proposed legislation?
Guardian Unlimited Politics | Special Reports | Tories not amused by Blunkett's bill:
Light of the World
As we are in Advent and Christmas is approaching I will take this opportunity to share some lyrics which I wrote a handful of years ago. The tune is 'O Sacred King' by Matt Redman and I have tended to use a rather nice backing track on Re:Source 2000 as it has the right kind of feel.
I've tried to write something that is theologically beefy with ancient resonances as well as poetically evocative of the scientific language that goes around the edges of mystical writing nowadays.
Light of the World
of glory poured
Word of God fleshed out in spacetime
Love of God tested in pain
O gladdening light
enlightening all
we embrace love you've made human
light of truth that sets us free
For it's the mystery of the universe
the uncreated makes a home
in created time and space.
And now you share your self with us
pouring Godlife into death
breaking open life in us.
Jesus, Splice eternity in us
encode in us your Godwardness
and centre us.
Copyright © Andii Bowsher 2000
It's Creative commons; in this case it by all means non-commercially, just attribute.
I've tended to use it as an opening song in Advent through to Candlemas alongside a candle lighting opening prayer or activity.
I've tried to write something that is theologically beefy with ancient resonances as well as poetically evocative of the scientific language that goes around the edges of mystical writing nowadays.
Light of the World
of glory poured
Word of God fleshed out in spacetime
Love of God tested in pain
O gladdening light
enlightening all
we embrace love you've made human
light of truth that sets us free
For it's the mystery of the universe
the uncreated makes a home
in created time and space.
And now you share your self with us
pouring Godlife into death
breaking open life in us.
Jesus, Splice eternity in us
encode in us your Godwardness
and centre us.
Copyright © Andii Bowsher 2000
It's Creative commons; in this case it by all means non-commercially, just attribute.
I've tended to use it as an opening song in Advent through to Candlemas alongside a candle lighting opening prayer or activity.
What the Bleep Do We Know!?
This looks interesting; or at least if, like me, you are interested in the interaction of popular culture with pop science and pop mysticism ... for eveyone else it, no doubt, is deeply hokum. I for one will be looking out for this to appear in the UK. In the light of recently reported trends it's surely a must for serious emerging church culture-watchers.
What the Bleep Do We Know!? - The Movie
What the Bleep Do We Know!? - The Movie
BIll Bright's last bequest
Reported towards the end of a heart-warming story of reconciliation between Jim Wallis and Bill Bright.
"Did you hear?" he asked. "Bill Bright just died." We looked at the postmark on the letter and compared it to the news reports of Bill's death. We concluded that writing me this letter was one of the last things that Bill Bright did on earth. Bill sent a $1,000 gift to the magazine that had exposed his most embarrassing moment more than 30 years before,
It's worth reading, not least because it is a spur towards making those hard choices to apologise, make up, be reconciled; it's the gospel.
SojoMail
"Did you hear?" he asked. "Bill Bright just died." We looked at the postmark on the letter and compared it to the news reports of Bill's death. We concluded that writing me this letter was one of the last things that Bill Bright did on earth. Bill sent a $1,000 gift to the magazine that had exposed his most embarrassing moment more than 30 years before,
It's worth reading, not least because it is a spur towards making those hard choices to apologise, make up, be reconciled; it's the gospel.
SojoMail
Local food for kids
A page promoting locally grown and organis-ish food presented in a way kids might just be okay with.
A Tale of Two Tomatoes: Local Lucy & Traveling Tom
A Tale of Two Tomatoes: Local Lucy & Traveling Tom
auction to exorcise father's ghost
This is a fascinating little vignette. No question that the non-existence of the alleged ghost is taken for granted but this is a psychological tool to rid a child of his fears. My issue is whether it will work -especially if the child gets to know of the ploy as ploy. It's a risky project; what if the boy 's imagination doesn't play ball and the story goes on that the ghost has refused to go -or more interestingly refuses to be sold into slavery? What if it does go but the boy wants to write to the new 'owner'? And os on ....
And then what of the difference of perception between the boy who thought his grandfather [or at least the ghost] to be mean and the mother who states him to have been "the sweetest and most caring man ...". Hmmm, aren't we glad we're not having to unravel that situation?
More than all of this, though, is the cultural comment waiting in the wings; if buying is the way we acquire things that enhance our life then selling becomes a way to exorcise things from it ... the true commercialisation and consumerisation of the supernatural is truly underway! -Even if under the guise of a post-modern irony. Don't bother wth the priest folks; just sell the souls of your dead into slavery. If Nike could only work out how to get them to sew ...
CNN.com - Woman auctions father's ghost on eBay - Dec 4, 2004
And then what of the difference of perception between the boy who thought his grandfather [or at least the ghost] to be mean and the mother who states him to have been "the sweetest and most caring man ...". Hmmm, aren't we glad we're not having to unravel that situation?
More than all of this, though, is the cultural comment waiting in the wings; if buying is the way we acquire things that enhance our life then selling becomes a way to exorcise things from it ... the true commercialisation and consumerisation of the supernatural is truly underway! -Even if under the guise of a post-modern irony. Don't bother wth the priest folks; just sell the souls of your dead into slavery. If Nike could only work out how to get them to sew ...
CNN.com - Woman auctions father's ghost on eBay - Dec 4, 2004
Recycling Techno Trash
"People simply don't know where to take their e-trash,"
It's all too true; if only we could find ways to make it simple. Kerbside collection would be good but that's patchy. It has to be easy enough and cheap enough at the point of use to prevent dumping and misallocation.
There are a few things going on:
A few such efforts have been kept rather quiet. Motorola's website has a prepaid postage label to use on a mailer that can contain an old mobile phone from any manufacturer. Motorola launched the program four months ago but hasn't publicized it much.
And yet there are busninesses crying out for the chance to get hold of the stuff: Recyclers .... are working on creative ways to bring in more material. David Beschen, president of GreenDisk in Sammamish, Wash. is working with the U.S. Postal Service on a plan to get used electronics equipment to postal processing centers in trucks that have already dropped off the day's mail. Recyclers are seeing their volume increase. Wireless phone recycling and refurbishing company Collective Good says it takes in about eight tons of cell phones a month. Another company, ReCellular, says it processes 10,000 to 15,000 phones a day.
Wired News: Who's Recycling Techno Trash?:
It's all too true; if only we could find ways to make it simple. Kerbside collection would be good but that's patchy. It has to be easy enough and cheap enough at the point of use to prevent dumping and misallocation.
There are a few things going on:
A few such efforts have been kept rather quiet. Motorola's website has a prepaid postage label to use on a mailer that can contain an old mobile phone from any manufacturer. Motorola launched the program four months ago but hasn't publicized it much.
And yet there are busninesses crying out for the chance to get hold of the stuff: Recyclers .... are working on creative ways to bring in more material. David Beschen, president of GreenDisk in Sammamish, Wash. is working with the U.S. Postal Service on a plan to get used electronics equipment to postal processing centers in trucks that have already dropped off the day's mail. Recyclers are seeing their volume increase. Wireless phone recycling and refurbishing company Collective Good says it takes in about eight tons of cell phones a month. Another company, ReCellular, says it processes 10,000 to 15,000 phones a day.
Wired News: Who's Recycling Techno Trash?:
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"Spend and tax" not "tax and spend"
I got a response from my MP which got me kind of mad. You'll see why as I reproduce it here. Apologies for the strange changes in types...
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"'Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have come not to abolish but to fulfill. For truly I tell yo...
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from: http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Guardian/Pix/online/2012/5/22/1337672561216/Annular-solar-eclipse--008.jpg -
I'm not sure people have believed me when I've said that there have been discovered uncaffeinated coffee beans. Well, here's one...