flood

So - interesting week for the Rees's.
We're up in Scotland on holiday and meantime, the photo on the left shows you what's been happening on our street. The white house you can see on the right hand side is ours.
So - that's going to be fun to go back to on Saturday!
Thankfully, we have fantastic friends nearby who have been amazing. They have keys for our place and have been in and moved most of our stuff upstairs and even got some of the neighbours to help them put our sofa up on breeze blocks. By all accounts the community spirit has been amazing (and we're gutted we've missed out on that). Our mates went to bed slightly pissed the other night cos they'd been invited into so many houses for a glass of wine!
So - we've been trying to have a holiday up here while listening to the news reports and getting updates from our friends. It's not easy to relax - especially when you switch on the TV to find a Top Gear special on BBC2 where Jeremy Clarkson sets out to prove it's possible to drive to the North Pole! Great timing mate - my house is underwater, due undoubtedly in part to global warming and you're driving across the polar ice caps. Nice one! Tosser.
Is it time to start rounding up two of each species?
Thankfully it sounds like the levels are starting to drop.

Live Earth

Well then, Live Earth. I have to say I was disappointed.
It made me depressed at the lack of genuine musical talent that there is out there (although I guess those with that kind of talent were probably not 'household names' and therefore weren't gonna get invited).
I know that focusing on the music is kinda missing the point but some of it was soooo dire - I mean...The Pussycat Dolls?!! A bunch of go-go dancers pretending to be a band. Watching them made me think that the end of civilisation as we know it wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing.

And I loved the way that so many of the bands desperately hunted through their back catalogue to try and find a song or two that had some sort of connection with the environment. Unfortunately, for the aforementioned Pussycat Dolls that means 'Don't you wish your girlfriend was HOT like me?' - at least it had the word hot in the title.

Having said all that I do genuinely like Al Gore. And he did make a point of saying that these concerts were only the beginning of a 2 year programme to change popular perception (apparently more than half the people in the UK, let alone the US, still don't believe human beings are contributing to climate change). God bless him and the work he is doing.

It's easy to be cynical about these things. Chris Rock, the American comedian, when interviewed by (the very annoying) Jonathan Ross, said that he believed Live Earth would solve the problem of climate change in the same way that Live Aid solved the problem of world hunger. Easy to be cynical, harder to remain positive and try to make a positive contribution. Gore has to be respected for that.

And anything involving a reformed Spinal Tap can't be all bad. Their new single 'Warmer than Hell' (in which they ponder the relative temperatures of hell and a climate changed earth and muse on which one Satan would enjoy more) was possibly the musical highlight of the day.

Sister Corita

When we were in St Ives a few weeks ago we went to the Tate - like you do. There was a great exhibition on at the time (it's still on) called 'If Everybody had an Ocean' based on the life and music of Brian Wilson from the Beach Boys.
Anyway, one of the artists whose work was featured in the exhibition was a new one on me - Sister Corita Kent. She was a Catholic nun and quite an extraordinary graphic artist who was quite prominent in the 60's counter-culture. Someone said that she did for bread and wine what Andy Warhol did for Campbell's tinned soup. I was quite taken with the pieces of hers that were in the exhibition and particularly with the way that her faith, art, and the counterculture blended to produce some striking results. For example, how's this for an altar piece:

or this....and here are some of the nun's from Sister Corita's community in production...


Anyway, if this flips your widget you can find out more about Sister Corita here or purchase an art book with lots of her stuff in on Amazon.

Cowley Road Carnival Tomorrow

Tomorrow is the annual Cowley Road Carnival. I love it. For one day they close the whole road to traffic and thousands of people flood the street - it's Oxford's most multicultural area so there's lots of local flavours and colours to enjoy and celebrate. There's a great party vibe and it's very evocative of the kingdom of God.

Last year's was great - I remember dancing on the street to some local soundsystems and generally having a great time in the sun. Doesn't look like there'll be much of that this year though!

A few of us from hOME have decided to volunteer this year and help out serving - doing set up for some of the stages and stewarding etc. Because I have an unusual clergy job it means that tomorrow morning, instead of being in a church somewhere, I can be getting my sleeves literally rolled up and helping to make the Carnival happen.

If you live locally it's really not one to miss!

As hOME meets on Sunday evenings in the Community centre hall - right in the centre of the action - we've decided to cancel our normal service and host a post-carnival chill out room instead (with prayer stations, ambient music, projections, floor cushions, lots of candle light etc.).

pet hate

just watching the Henman showdown from the first round of Wimbledon on the BBC and it's reminded me of one of my pet hates. For some reason the BBC in their wisdom only show their mini scoreboard (the one in the top left hand corner of the screen) while a point is in play - precisely the time that you want to be watching the play not looking at the score. In between points - when it would be a good time to check the score - they remove it. It's sooooo annoying! Does anyone have any idea why?

facebook = death of blogging?

It looks like everyone has been well and truly bitten by the great bug that is facebook - I know I certainly have. And it looks to me like there's far less blogging happening as a result. Certainly true in my case. But I don't want to let my blog slide totally so thought I would post something.

We had another soggy holiday in Cornwall last week (Pip and I are considering hiring ourselves out as water-shortage solutions consultants - you got a water shortage? just pay for us to come on holiday where you are and we can almost guarantee that it will rain the whole time we're there).

Came back to do Chris and Katharine's wedding on Saturday (see photo on left and below courtesy of Mel). hOME weddings seem to be like buses - we've had 2 in the last month and none before that. As a result we have unwittingly transitioned to a community that now has a large percentage of married/hooked up people. How did that happen?!

Corpus Christi

Today in the Church Calendar is Corpus Christi - which is a day of thanksgiving to God for the institution of the eucharist.
(the photo comes from the blog of Alan Creech)

It's a big festival in the Catholic world and even though we are not wanting to overly-identify ourselves with any ONE tradition, but drink deeply from all the wells, I am thankful for the eucharist.

It keeps us anchored in the story of the gospel.
We celebrate the eucharist in hOME at every worship gathering (weekly) and I think it's really important that we do so.
At the Last Supper Jesus took, blessed, broke, and shared the bread. The four main 'actions' of the eucharist - taking, blessing, breaking and sharing are also the four main elements of the Christ story. Jesus was given (or taken), blessed by God, broken (primarily on the cross) and shared out for the life of the world as the living bread.

So each time we celebrate the eucharist we are re-enacting the heart of our faith.

But those 4 actions also encapsulate God's action upon us:
he gathers us, he blesses us, he breaks us, and he shares us out for the life of the world : we experience this on both an individual level and a corporate level in Christian community.

So for this reason (and there are others too - for example eucharist reminds us of the essential goodness of physicality), I'm glad we re-tell the story each week in our worship gathering.

interfaith walk for peace

Went on the annual interfaith walk for peace yesterday (see picture on left including one of our guys - Andy - who somehow became chief steward for the march - in the foreground with rather cheeky pose!).
We started at the Synagogue and then walked on to the University church and then on to the Mosque in East Oxford. All the Abrahamic faiths together (+ others too). I even 'collared up' for the occasion (not something I do that often).
In an age of distrust and fear it seems even more important these days to do this sort of thing.
For me I'm not at all going down that relativistic route of saying we're all basically believing the same thing (apart from anything else that would be very disrespectful of the other faiths who, largely, wouldn't want to say that at all). Just saying that we have respect for each other, value each other, can learn from each other, and do not fear each other. And these seem like things worth saying.

Richard Rohr @ York

Absolutely blown away by Richard Rohr at the conference I went to in York over the weekend. He's in my Jedi Council for sure.
I said to someone I feel like I've been born again again.
There's a lot of talk in emerging circles about 'powerless discourse' and a kind of doing away with the 'expert'. I disagree. Put someone who knows what they're talking about in a big room, preferably on a stage, give them a microphone and let them talk at me for hours on end. I don't particularly want to go to something like this and pool my ignorance with a load of strangers in small groups. I want to listen to a spiritual master, which Rohr undoubtedly is.
Of course, we need to make sure we're not confusing this for the real work however. The rubber hits the road when we take this stuff back into Christian community and learn together how to live it out. That's a much more appropriate context for 'powerless discourse' if you ask me.
Anyway - it was truly inspirational stuff. He was basically talking about how bad the church has been at facilitating true transformation in people. That true transformation comes through wisdom (which is actually a common description of the Spirit in the scriptures) but the church hasn't developed a wisdom culture but instead been obsessed with what he calls 'informational knowledge' i.e. it's about getting more and better information, knowing how to label things correctly etc. The church has by and large operated in this early level consciousness.
Instead we need to know how to get beyond what he calls the 'dualistic mind' to wisdom and the 'contemplative mind' which can deliver true transformation.
Of course he said a lot of other things too! I'm looking forward to listening again to the CD's.

Of particular interest to people reading this blog might be the fact that he talked in the last session about the emerging church. In his view it has 3 characteristics:

1. An honest reading of Jesus - not reading the gospels to score denominational points but an openness to receive ALL of Christ's teaching. The church has often emphasised things that Jesus didn't emphasise and ignored things that Jesus did emphasise! The emerging church is seeking to take the whole of Christ's teaching seriously.

2. A passion of justice, peace, and ecological issues.

3. An openness to developing the contemplative mind. (He joked that he would always rather talk about scripture to Catholics, and contemplation to Protestants because both groups are very happy to admit that they know little about these things...the problem comes when trying to teach scripture to Protestants and contemplation to Catholics cos both groups think they have it all worked out in those areas and don't have what he calls 'Beginners Mind'.)

Anyway - as you can see...I'm a bit of a fan...and there is a bit of a guru thing around Rohr which I know he's quite embarassed about (he said so). I did say to my travelling companions (great to be there with Jim from hOME and Ian and Gail from mayBe) that if the weekend ended in a mass wedding we were all in trouble...!!

a travesty of justice...

there was no way Naomi should have been fired from The Apprentice last night. I predicted Simon's firing about 5 mins into the programme and I stand by my judgement. He was easily more culpable than Naomi for the failure of the task. Sir Alan 'cocked it up royal' (surely a new catchphrase in the making) with his decision last night (and I have a terrible feeling that Katie is going to be in the final!).

Richard Rohr in York

I'm looking forward to travelling to York this coming weekend for the Richard Rohr conference that Contemplation & Action UK are organising.

Rohr is a Franciscan monk and the founder of the Center for Action and Contemplation in Albuquerque, New Mexico (had to look the spelling up on that one!). As he himself says, the most important word in the phrase 'contemplation and action' is the word 'and'.

I was blown away by hearing him speak at Greenbelt a couple of years ago and his book 'Everything Belongs - the gift of Contemplative Prayer' made a big impression on me when I read it last year.

It's great that I have some traveling companions too...Jim from the hOME community, and Ian (my brother nu-monastic Abbot from the mayBe community also in Oxford) and his wife, Gail.

Should be a good weekend.

Pentecost

Really enjoyed our Pentecost service last night. We focused in on the four most well used metaphors for the Spirit - fire, water, breath/wind, and oil.
I did a little thought for the day on what it means to be witnesses - which is why the Spirit is given according to Jesus (and he should know).
It seems to me that we are witnesses in who we are and in what we do. i.e. it's about identity and vocation. And when the Spirit comes something happens in these two areas that make us into witnesses. I looked at Adam - the breath/ruach/spirit of God enters him and makes him into a living being (identity) and there follows the creation mandate (vocation) to be fruitful and multiply etc. We then looked at the baptism of Christ - the Spirit comes and we are told that this is God's Son whom he loves (identity) and immediately after he begins his ministry (vocation). We then went to the Pentecost narrative and saw how the Spirit was given to form the church (identity) and to lead it into mission (vocation).
We then looked at the four images of the Spirit - fire, wind, oil, and water - and discussed what experiencing the Spirit in those ways might mean for us in terms of discipleship (identity) and mission (vocation).
I thought it was a really helpful discussion.
We then had these 4 elements laid out around the room and people interacted with them in whatever way they found helpful, turning their encounter with the elements into prayer for themselves and others.
We also read some fantastic quotes from Hildegard of Bingen, Elizabeth Johnson, Clark Pinnock and Pope John Paul II on the Spirit and I'm including jpegs of the slides here if anyone wants to click on them to enlarge and read them.

how will you be defined in the dictionary?

a bit of fun for Saturday.....go here, enter your name, and see how your name would be defined in an (imaginary) dictionary. Mine came out as follows:

Matt --
[noun]:

A dance involving little to no clothing.

I also particularly liked the entry for my friend Jim who appears as....

jim --
[noun]:

A lewd street performer

Although it does seem like you get a different answer if you refresh so it's obviously totally random.

Katie and Eddie

is it just me or do Katie off The Apprentice and Eddie Izzard bear more than a passing resemblance to each other? See the photos below and judge for yourself.














Katie(left) and Eddie (right)

You never see them in the same room together that's for sure.

Pentecost

wisdom from Benedict and Joan

Part of my practice recently has involved daily readings from Joan Chittister's commentary on the Rule of Benedict. I was particularly struck by her words this morning:

A willingness to be formed is the basis of formation. Anything else is fraud.....you can't get the spiritual life by waiting for it. You have to reach for it. Read things that gild your soul. Turn your mind to prayer, to a conscious response to the God present here and now. Remember who you are.
The ancients considered the gift of tears as a sign of God's great favour. If we could only be always sorry for what we have done to distort life in the past then perhaps we could be safeguarded against distorting it in the future. Regret is a gift long gone in contemporary culture but critically needed perhaps. In this society , guilt has disappeared and sorrow is labeled unhealthy. As a people, then, we separate one action from another in such a way that patterns escape us and pitfalls elude us. We simply stumble on, from one event to the next, unaware of the dangers in it for us, uncaring of our past behaviours, unfeeling of the callouses on our hearts.
Life, Benedict implies, is a tapestry woven daily from yesterday's threads. The colours don't change, only the shapes we give them. Without the past to guide us, the future itself may succumb to it.

"it's just a step to the right....."

Well done to those who spotted the Rocky Horror allusion above.
Sad, but not entirely surprised, to see my old theological college hitting the headlines in yesterday's Guardian. It's changed a lot since I was there and I think a number of people saw this coming. A good friend of mine is studying there at the moment so I hope this won't adversely affect his training.

stations of the resurrection

Over the last 5 weeks we've been doing the Stations of the Resurrection. Instead of 'prayer' stations we made them 'teaching' stations instead. We used 11 different passages (left out the apocryphal 'Jesus meets his mother' and the ascension + pentecost which we are saving for the coming weeks).
We laid out the 11 Stations around the room each week - the passages were printed out and there were large pieces of paper and assorted coloured pens - and each week people visited a couple of the Stations, read the passage, and wrote down any questions or thoughts they had about the passage, or drew a picture, answered questions other people had left etc. The idea being that we built on each other's theological work over the course of the 4 weeks we engaged with these Stations.
Last night we wrapped it up with a recap and a discussion on what we had been learning. I really like this Latin-American idea of entrusting the Word to the people, rather than the 'professional priest' always controlling the content.
Unfortunately I forgot to take some photos but hopefully you get the general idea.

wedding

A real privilege yesterday to conduct the marriage of Martin and Juliet - two guys from hOME - at a little village just outside Oxford. It was a great day. Suzie took some great photos (as usual) - these are from her set. The full set is here.

Cranes

So - it occurred to me yesterday....how do you put a crane up? Not the smaller ones on the backs of lorries like this one on the left, but the tower kind, which are huge. More like this:
To get something that big and heavy into the air you'd need a crane wouldn't you? So do they use cranes to put up cranes? But then how did the first crane (the one they use to put the second one up) get put up?

It could be one of the great unsolved mysteries of the universe.