An Evening with Dave Tomlinson - Re-enchanting Christianity

On Weds 11th November 7.30pm onwards, we welcome Dave Tomlinson to talk and discuss his influential new book, re-enchanting Christianity. This book which came out this year, has influenced a lot of us in the Moot Community.

This discussion will be part one of two gatherings, one now, and one in January looking at different aspects of Dave's book.

We are currently exploring how to develop relationships further between St Lukes and Moot, as there is much we share in common.

Venue: The Spirituality Centre, Lombard Street, London.

MONDAY 9th NOVEMBER - INSPIRING CITIZENS

What does it mean to be a citizen of London in one of the most multi-cultural capitals of the world?

With Neil Jameson of London Citizens and the Strangers into Citizens campaign, Grace Cowley of Mother's Union and Iman Suliman Gani

from the Balham Mosque, who highlight tensions, aspirations and needs of some of those who are living and working in London.

Time: 7pm

Venue: The Main Church

holistic recession. it's not all money

I've been thinking about receding and dereliction, and the financial alongside the emotional, physical, natural, cerebral etc. threads of our humanity. My CEO is speaking about these as lean years, like Joseph's seven years of want after seven years of plenty. A challenge and another depth of being human, not a dualistic good/bad, not straightforward 'we had, and now we have not'.

As charities and corporates alike face mass redundancies and budget freezes, I have been thinking of the privilege of being called up to fight harder, stretch thinner, see the value of our resources with almost fresh eyes, and work harder at stretching them to their fullest; stretching ourselves, myself, to our furthest.

And I have been thinking this is a holistic thing, not just a financial or material one.

"I began to understand spiritual life in an entirely new way, as a journey deep into Godlessness rather than out of it. Increasingly I see that it is in going deeper into the derelict places within us, where we curse and deny God, in resting without flinching in the knowledge of our distance from God that we encounter Christ waiting for us in the depth of hell."
The gift of self, Heather Ward

Contrasting with this in my head is something William Blake wrote in a letter after a late, fresh, conversion-type experience, when he felt himself in a place of tremendous spiritual and holistic abundance:

"...he lays his Hand upon my Head & gives a blessing to all my works; why should I be troubled? why should my heart & flesh cry out? I will go on in the Strength of the Lord; through Hell will I sing forth his Praises, that the Dragons of the Deep may praise him, & that those who dwell in darkness & in the Sea coasts may be gathered into his Kingdom. Excuse my, perhaps, too great Enthusiasm..."

What is occurring to me is that recession and dereliction are spiritual things, holistic things, human and otherly, and that they are bigger, fuller, than simple good/bad algorithms. Like God, I guess.

I was sitting in the chaplaincy after yet another dose of Anglo-catholic spirituality and I found out from my friend Michael that some people were going on a vigil. This Vigil was for a gay man who got beaten up outside a gay bar by 20 teenagers, luckily the guy survived. Judging by his partner who turned up for the ceremony he probably isn't much older than me. It still shows that we are far from a peaceful society when things like this still happen, but having said that the entire street where the vigil was packed with probably close to 1,000 people who turned up to condemn the attack. I wanted to encourage moot in its inclusivity and equality because there are very few places where people who struggle with their sexual orientation can go within the church and be loved rather than tolerated. We should all ask ourselves how far we are prepared to go to love our neighbour as ourselves and build a community where these values are enshrined. I just wanted to end on a question: How can we be counter cultural and better show love that as christians we are required to show, but don't always show to our neighbour?

Wild Wednesday: Martin Newell joins us to discuss radical discipleship and political action

I am pleased to say that Martin Newell of the Catholic Worker community and the Trident Ploughshares, who we interviewed for the podcast last week, is coming to chat through the implications of this form of radical discipleship on Weds 4th Nov, London Centre for Spirituality Bookshop 7.45pm. For more info on Martin, see the blogpost below.

MOOT SEEKS ARTISTIC DIRECTOR

Politics and that..

Well, it appears from what I can gather from the other side of the channel that the world of politics is as heated as ever.

I'm really glad that some of these issues are being wrestled with on here but as a little side note I wanted to throw this extract from Jean Vanier's Community and Growth into the mix. Despite being written a little while ago, I still think it has a lot to say to today's situations.

"Some Christians are very taken up by politics. They can be terribly anti-communist, forming rather fascist organisations to fight the "red devil." Or they can be fiercely anti-capitalist, fighting for new structures and redistribution of resources. Both these tendencies can lead to a centralization- whether to protect the free market economy or to further wholesale nationalization.

I sometimes wonder if these fighting Christians wouldn't do better to put their energies into creating communities which live as far as they can by the charter of the Beatitudes. If they did this, they would be able to live by, and measure progress by, values other than those of material success, acquisition of wealth, and political struggle. They could become the yeast in the dough of society. They would not change political structures at first. But they would change the hearts and spirits of the people around them by offering them a glimpse of a new dimension in human life... of inwardness, love, contemplation, wonderment and sharing.

My personal hope is that, if this spirit of community really spreads, structures will change. Structures are - tyrannies excepted - the mirrors of hearts."

p308-309

I love Jesus' image of the kingdom of heaven as a mustard seed, maybe we need to start thinking smaller.

Hope all's well, am gutted I can't make the weekend away. Hope to hear from you all soon.

A couple of thoughts

I watched (as Im sure a lot of other people did) nick griffin make a bit of an idiot of himself on question time. I just wanted to put a couple of thoughts out there and see what response I got. Its been really interesting being in Liverpool, especially from an ethnic point of view because it is very homogenous (white, in layman's terms) and coming from south London it has been surprising how much of a contrast in attitude there is towards those of ethnicity in the north of the UK and the South. A few of my friends from areas like Yorkshire and Bradford feel overwhelmed and in the minority when it comes to feeling comfortable in their home town and these areas in particular are areas where the BNP has managed to gain a foothold. From my own experience I have felt less uncomfortable (and I realise I have got to be careful what I say here) around Liverpool than I have around areas of south London. I realise that the BNP offers nothing except intolerance, but if we left them to the side for a minute what are we to do about the hundreds of thousands of people who feel that they have to turn to an openly racist organisation to be heard?

I look forward to some (heated?) discussion on this.

Podcast interview with a Christian activist

In this month's podcast, Ian Mobsby interviews Martin Sewell, who is an ordained member of the Catholic Worker Movement, and a political activist. Martin talks about his sense of vocation, identifying with a monastic rhythm of life, where going to prison can be seen as an extended version of a monastery cell. Martin talks with passion about the cost of this form of discipleship, particularly around the area of just resistance, and shares his hopes for what might be. To listen to the podcast, click here

Christ, Friend God and the Kin-dom Podcast

In her last gift to the Moot Community, Jemma Allen explores 'Christ, Friend God and the Kin-dom' in the Moot Eucharist on Sun 11th October. Jemma is off back to New Zealand tomorrow. I am really grateful for all that she has brought to the Moot Community and to me personally. So do listen to this important podcast which goes deep into our ethos and focus of the Moot Community.

Friendship is not some gimmick that we can market as a way of successfully living a Christian life. It is not even primarily about about an act of will or making friendships in a calculating way. Friendship as a spiritual practice, as the mark of a disciple, as a proclamation of the Good News of the Reign of God – this friendship is about entering into authentic relationships, relationships of vulnerability and trust, relationships of mutuality and care. In allowing ourselves to be affected by who we live with and how we live with them, by the gifts we receive in and from our friends, we open ourselves to being transformed by love and so enlarging the realm of God: the kinship and new community proclaimed by Christ. That, my friends, would be Good News!

T S Elliott

Given that we are using T S Elliott's poem of St Mary Woolnoth at the moment in worship services, thought people would be interested in a programme about him on iplayer click here

The need for non-monarchial language for God

Have you ever noticed how often the word "Lord" is used in Church. We Christians use it heavily for naming God. The problem is, that it is, as a word, quite anachronistic to modern parlance. For many Lord and King, creates a sense of an outdated approach to governance, a hierarchical approach to social organisation. In our brave new post-secular culture, we need to be careful not to be lazy about our language for God, and the importance to seek out constantly changing language as a metaphor for God.

I have just met up for a coffee with Padraig, who talked about an indigenous South African word for God as the 'Big Big'. I like that as a metaphor, as it is saying that God is bigger than the biggest thing you can imagine, so the God that is outside of our imagination... so encourages the sense of transcendence without imposing majestic androcentric understandings onto God the Creator. He also named another metaphor used by a friend of his for God, as 'The Bigest' I like that too.

On Sunday, Jemma Allen, our friendly New Zealand Priest continues her unpacking of a theology of friendship, to talk about the Kin-dom rather than the Kingdom, which again reconstructions an understanding of friendship as the locus of God's purposes to draw all things back into restored relationships with the divine.

Water needs to be included in Climate change negotiations

Believe it or not, but the climate change negotiations at Copenhagen and the United Nations are not including water on the agenda, which threatens serious side effects for impoverished farmers around the world. A coalition of Progressio, a Catholic Institute for International Relations, and the SCC have joined forces to get water included in the negotiations. They are asking people to fill in an online petition, which then can be sent in into your MP. I've done it and it takes less than 2 minutes of your time, so go on do it now, click here

I like progressio's vision:

Development means building skills, strengthening communities, finding solutions. It means challenging the structures and policies that keep people poor. It means long term, lasting change. And the way we do it is through people.

On Saturday 5 December 2009, ahead of the crucial UN climate summit in Copenhagen, tens of thousands of people from all walks of life will flow through the streets of London to demonstrate their support for a safe climate future for all. The Wave is organised by the Stop Climate Chaos Coalition. Join The Wave - the UK’s biggest ever demonstration in support of action on climate change. They want the UK Government to Quit Dirty Coal, Protect the Poorest and Act Fair & Fast. Add The Wave to your Facebook and Tweet this.

What's the Plan?

• Assemble: 12pm, Grosvenor Square
• Climax: 3pm Encircling of Parliament
• Dress code: Blue!
• Map click here

Corey Hau

For those who attended last nights short Autumn Night Prayer Service in the rear of St Mary Woolnoth, here is the image that was on the front of the service sheet.

You can read more about the story here.

Corey Hau is a great photographer (and a great friend of mine) whose work can be viewed here

Exhibition: Cecil Collins - Fools and angels

Follow title link to details of an exhibition at Central Saint Martins of the work of visionary artist, poet and philosopher Cecil Collins.
In his words: ‘I believe in a new and virgin romanticism, a cosmic romanticism, based on contact with the rhythm of eternal life.’
Cecil Collins, The vision of the fool and other writings, Golgonooza Press, Ipswich 2002

Change to Wild Wednesday this week Weds 7th October from 7.45pm

Unfortunately our speaker for Weds 7th Oct can't make this weds, so we are going out for a drink in the Wheatsheaf near London Bridge Station, (note new address is 24 Southwark Street SE1 1TY), for more info on the pub click here

For more info contact Richard or email here

Jonny loves moot

Those of you who are not following Jonny Baker's blog (and if not, why not? You should be!) Might be interested to know that he's given moot's latest podcast a really good write up.

To quote: "I recommend a listen to ian mobsby's interview with stuart burns which is on the moot podcast. stuart is the abbot of the burford benedictine community. i visited burford priory a few years back to have a look at their grass labyrinth and learned how to mow one. the community has since moved from burford but i have heard from several people what a wise guy stuart is. a few pieces stood out for me..."

Have a look.

Monbiot on Population growth

I've just come across a great article by George Monbiot on the subject population growth.

Published in the Guardian, he shows how climate change has nothing to do with population growth, but is in fact related to consumption and wealth of and by the rich.


You can read the full article, but consider this quote:

"People breed less as they become richer, but they don’t consume less; they consume more. As the habits of the super-rich show, there are no limits to human extravagance. Consumption can be expected to rise with economic growth until the biosphere hits the buffers. Anyone who understands this and still considers that population, not consumption, is the big issue is, in Lovelock’s words, “hiding from the truth”. It is the worst kind of paternalism, blaming the poor for the excesses of the rich.

So where are the movements protesting about the stinking rich destroying our living systems? Where is the direct action against superyachts and private jets? Where’s Class War when you need it?

It’s time we had the guts to name the problem. It’s not sex; it’s money. It’s not the poor; it’s the rich."

I couldn't have put it better myself.

Read the full article in full.

Moot Podcast - New Monasticism re-imagined from an Abbot's perspective

In this month's podcast, Abbot Stuart Burns is interviewed by Ian Mobsby to explore his thoughts and hopes about New Monasticism, and Emerging/Fresh Expressions of Church - click here for the link.

Nailing colours to the mast (a debate on Piracy)

OK, there's a rather interesting debate going on in the blogosphere at the moment sparked off by a series of posts from Kester Brewin.

He's taken the idea of Piracy, and how it can apply as a motif for a number of things in the Church. I won't delve into it deeply here - I really recommend that you read it for yourself, as it's a great concept that gets you thinking about a number of issues, and there are some nice ideas that lie behind the central motif.

Here are Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Five, Part Six, Part Seven.

However, shortly after, Richard Sudworth wrote a great critique of Kester's position. I thought Richard's critique was really helpful, and if you follow down the comments, you can see my responses.

Although the debate is a really healthy one, I do have a worry. My concern is that by disagreeing, I've just given more ammunition to people who don't like what Kester and Pete Rollins are doing, and especially to people who don't like the emerging church idea. This was never my intention - I see it more as a healthy disagreement amongst friends, and I thought it was important for Richard to bring out a different light on the matter. It's certainly not about "taking sides".

Anyway, since then, Jonny Baker, Mark Berry and Maggi Dawn have all commented on their own blogs, and now, finally Pete Rollins has written a response.

Pete's response is good, because he articulates his position well on a number of points, and clarifies things on the debate. It's a good post for people like myself who don't always have time to read as much they want to, and his post simplifies things succinctly. I recommend a read.

I don't actually like rum very much, but Yo Ho Ho anyway.

[UPDATE]

The debate continues apace! But it has probably now settled down a little to something resembling an ending:
First, Richard Sudworth delivered a riposte
Second, Ben Edson chipped in
Lastly Pete Rollins responds again.

Some very good thinking going on here, and I'm very grateful for all those who contributed to the debate.

The meditation from last night as a couple of people asked it get put here

I have a bit of a thing about party debris. I love empty bottles and cans lining mantelpieces, burnt out tea lights, wet fag ends, redundant corks. The crashed out bodies of last night’s revellers in duvets around a house, resisting the morning light. The dregs of drinks in hungover cups along bookshelves, the glass distorting the titles on the spines of my books.

I love cleaning it all up – it’s not particularly unselfish, it’s just the most evocative kind of cleaning. I like it. I probably feel cool doing it.

This morning in someone else’s kitchen, picking over bottle tops and soggy cupcake papers, I thought, – I’ve had a thing about the debris for a while but I’d not thought about what I liked about it much – and this morning I thought, it’s coz we were alive last night, – I look at the shrapnel and I know we had fun. – I’m not dead. I’m not going quietly. It’s a relief. My limbs work. My blood isn’t thin.

The Thames in the Fire Sermon carries no party debris. “The river bears no empty bottles, --/ Silk handkerchiefs, cigarette ends /Or other testimony of summer nights. The nymphs are departed. /And their friends, the loitering heirs of city directors; /Departed, have left no addresses”. No party debris, and the people we knew or didn’t know, who populated our line of vision, have left; and it feels hollow.

I usually go excited to parties; usually like London. Like Tower Bridge, scaffolding on one tower last time I saw it; like the lanterns along More London, the tiny beach at the South Bank, the ferry boats, the spines of Charing Cross Bridge, Westminster all gold and dusty, Battersea Power Station.

Sometimes my God rattles through my city air and my sinews and cartilage and the tube tunnels I’m shunted through daily.

Sometimes I want mundane, I want dead, I want mediocre quiet. Sometimes I’m hardly alive, and I hardly care; I’m in absence and everyone’s not here, and there’s no sign they have been, and God is in the everybody.

Moot Weekend Away to Arundel 20-22nd November 2009

Connected Minds

Following on from our very interesting discussion below about friendships, I came across this talk on the internet the other day, by the Royal Society for the Encouragement of the Arts, Manufactures and Commerce (RSA).

It was some random link that someone sent me on Twitter - can't remember who - but there is some excellent stuff here that could definitely feed into our discussion. I'm going to quote their precise here. Would love to know what you think:

"We think of ourselves as rugged, self-determining individualists, but our very existence rests on connected brains and minds. Social species such as ours do not fare well when forced to live solitary lives, and the impact of loneliness on individuals can be surprisingly damaging. Residents of transient communities and isolated individuals lack rich attachments, meaningful connections and enriching encounters, which can be deleterious on a physiological as well as psychological level.

An individual's complete involvement in a thriving, engaged and altruistic community is more than spiritually beneficial. As a social species, humans create emergent organisations beyond the individual—structures that range from dyads, families, and groups to cities, civilisations, and international alliances. These emergent structures evolved hand-in-hand with supporting genetic, neural, and hormonal mechanisms because the consequent social behaviors helped humans survive, reproduce, and care for offspring sufficiently long that they too survived to reproduce. We are only now beginning to truly understand the ramifications of our individualistic lifestyles, as our social brains struggle to cope with isolation, loneliness and failing communities.

Join Professor John Cacioppo, author of the bestselling book Loneliness and co-founder of the study of 'social neuroscience' as he outlines the vital importance of altruistic behaviour, social connection, and inclusive communities in this exclusive and important RSA event."

Listen to and/or watch the talk here.

Chers Amis,

After a fair few stresses I'm beginning to find my way round this strange city in which I ride into town on double decker trains and when I'm not dealing with the bureaucracy of it all, loiter in cafes (Don't worry I'll start working soon...honest!)

I've been reflecting on home a bit and recently read this story from Anne Lamott's Travelling Mercies and thought I'd share it on here.

".. her best friend got lost one day. The little girl ran up and down the streets of the big town where they lived but she couldn't find a single landmark. She was very frightened. Finally a policeman stopped to help her. He put her in the passenger seat of his car, and they drove around until she finally saw her church. She pointed it out to the policeman, and then she told him firmly, "You can let me out now. This is my church, and I can always find my home from here."

Really, I just wanted to say how much I appreciate how Moot has helped me find home in the last few years and I hope and pray that it continues to do so for others.

So know you're all in my thoughts and prayers.

...and if anyone finds themselves the wrong side of the English Channel do say bonjour.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/ayustety/ / CC BY-SA 2.0

Augustine cuts the crap

Lizzie and Jon constructed a beautiful service for us on Sunday about trash and junk and rubbish in our lives and getting away from it. In the prayers it struck me that saying 'Lord in your mercy' is about how flat on God's mercy we are, helpless on his mercy to clear the garbage we immerse ourselves in and can quietly drown amidst.

Preparing for this Sunday's service Tim and I have been looking into TS Eliot's Wasteland to work with the excerpt that we're framing our services around this month, and this morning I found this bit of St Augustine's Confessions which Eliot quotes ('To Carthage then I came / Burning burning burning burning / O Lord Thou pluckest me out / O Lord Thou pluckest / burning').

"And He is there, though they perceive Him not... And I, though I speak and see this, entangle my steps with these outward beauties; but Thou pluckest me out, O Lord, Thou pluckest me out; because Thy loving-kindness is before my eyes. For I am taken miserably, and Thou pluckest me out mercifully; sometimes not perceiving it, when I had but lightly lighted upon them; otherwhiles with pain, because I had stuck fast in them."