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CREATING COMMUNITIES OF WHOLENESS WITH CHRIST AT THE CENTRE
Blog Archives: April 2008 - March 2008 - February 2008 - January 2008 - December 2007 - November 2007 - October 2007 - September 2007 - August 2007 - July 2007 - June 2007 - May 2007 - April 2007 - March 2007 - February 2007 - January 2007 - December 2006 - November 2006 - October 2006 - September 2006
30th April, 7.35pm
Adam has run into a school bell [while it was being rung]. Anna has now bashed up her glasses with a banana! The story is that she was trying to take a reluctant banana off its bunch and when it finally submitted it did so so aggressively that it hit her on the nose and bent her glasses! You couldn't make it up.Adam has run into a school bell [while it was being rung]. Anna has now bashed up her glasses with a banana! The story is that she was trying to take a reluctant banana off its bunch and when it finally submitted it did so so aggressively that it hit her on the nose and bent her glasses! You couldn't make it up.
I was doing what I thought was a whole school assembly today and being just one day before 1st May thought that it would be good [and fun] to introduce Red Oaks to international labour day and the concept of the permanent revolution - and then make the link to Christian theology of justice [don't worry, there was lots of role play between suffering workers and oppressive bosses - it wasn't just theory but even so it was ambitious]. But then I found that the assembly was for Foundation [Nursery and reception] and while they were great at the role play I lost them on the permanent revolution!
28th April, 8.10pm
I'm almost tempted to vote Conservative in local elections - simply because they are the only party who have bothered to send me any election literature. My voting card is up in front of my desk, but I haven't seen any posters, have only had one election mailing, have hardly heard of the campaign [if it exists] on the news and the vote is only a few days ago. Yet these are votes for the councillors who will spend our council tax and determine so may different aspects of our communities - education, transport, housing, new developments, the list goes on...
I was at Anthony and Corrinna's house warming and blessing last night, and was asked how the churches could influence and affect our communities and our country. And then there was a question - when should we say 'yes' and when should we say 'no' to things. Well this is one time when I want to say yes - go vote. At the last general election I put posters for all of the candidates on my fence, because I don't [on one level] care who people vote for, I just want everyone to follow the example of the French and vote - we should raise turn out from the 23% figure of the last local elections to the 85% of the French Presidential poll.
And if that's an unrealistic expectation, we can surely raise the turn out to over 50%. And if the candidates standing for office seem to be ignoring the voters we can't ignore them - so go find out what they're standing for, work out if you agree with it, and if you agree with it, go and vote.
On a completely different level, Adam has discovered how to catch me when we're playing tag or stuck in the mud. He just keeps going, after me, ignoring the girls completely until age, agility and energy wins over size. I'm just waiting for the time when he can run faster.
25th April, 5.10pm
It's not unusual to receive injury reports when I pick up the children, usually collisions. But [thankfully] I don't normally receive two at once [as happened one day last week]. Nor do they usually make me laugh out loud. When when I heard that Adam had run into the school bell, while it was being rung in the playground, I couldn't stop chuckling. For the record I guess I should say that his teacher was concerned and that he is absolutely fine and within a few minutes of the collision was more than ready to start running into more moving and static objects [Adam doesn't discriminate!]
Its a new experience in this job but over the last week I've found myself being the voice of moderation, saying, stop, think, reflect, rather than jumping into the deep end - or perhaps I'm still jumping, its just that others are extending the pool and wanting to jump even deeper!
What we need to do over the next few weeks, as we implement many of the aspects of the strategy [community drop in, school bible club, signs and welcome packs etc] is to also look at our priorities over the coming year and perhaps our targets beyond that. And I have a huge English Heritage grant form to complete [for the St Andrew's roof]. There's some writing and thinking to be done! Any bids/suggestions/offers to help would be welcome!
15th April, 8.50pm
The sea was cold enough to be challenging - and whether or not because the sun was so hot, seemed colder than it has been all year. But hey, who needs to swim when you can make dams and eat cream teas and climb rocks and play pirates and draw and sleep. Its been a great holiday. Seems almost a shame to have to come back to work...
8th April, 9.30pm - EASTER DAY
There are times, not many but they do exist, when you've got enough people at a service and really don't want any more. Good Friday was one of those. We hosted a service for all of the churches in the northern part of Swindon at St Francis. I'd excepted about 100. Perhaps 30 from our parish and 70 from the rest. When it became clear that we were approaching 200 I began to panic, we were out of chairs and already sharing each service sheet between two people. But people kept on coming in. We raided the Key Stage Two classrooms for chairs, 'small and very small' with me thinking 'there's no way that we're going to remember where we got all of these from!' we still couldn't get the PA to work [to my shame it wasn't plugged in at the mains!] and my laptop and data projector had gone AWOL [in mind and spirit if not in body]. We eventually got to about 300 [with nearly 100 from North Swindon] and hey, all of the above are great problems to have. So we started, and spoke above the chatter of dozens of children [until the PA was plugged in - thank you David] and - on all kinds of seats, standing room and from the floor - we came to the foot of the cross.
While all this was happening another kind of panic was taking place in the Community Room as the two people who I had asked to do coffee and hot cross buns for 70-100 also began to count how many were actually there! They did magnificently. I haven't yet discovered whether they just prayed and more appeared [feeding of 5000 style] or if they went to the Co-op, but I think that the HCB's that were there for Sunday dawn got eaten.
We then had another hour of Children's activities, and then a completely different final hour at the cross at St Andrew's. It was a good Good Friday.
Holy Saturday - AKA Easter Eve [for anyone who revels in useless information Easter Saturday is the Saturday after Easter]was a day in two parts. I left Swindon with my Dad at 8am and headed west to the Beacons to climb Pen y fan [the highest peak in South Wales] and its satellites; with the sun, at times, hot enough to feel like June, and the ground just as dry. We got back, burnt and exhilarated, and I headed into St Francis for the first Confirmation ever to be held there.
Beth arrived and said 'we've gone all ecclesiastical' [with the help of things borrowed from St Mary's, Purton]. Nick said after the service that worship at St Francis always felt slightly 'on the edge'. I felt that St Francis was beginning to 'come of age' hosting services that stretched across the town and deanery.
But what really stuck in my mind was the faith and commitment of the candidates as they came forward, hearing their stories and witnessing their confirmation. And +Lee's sermon. Its a while since I've heard a sermon that has really impacted on me, but this one certainly did. Lee was talking about the calming of the storm and Jesus walking on water. The risk of stepping out into the deep is something that I'm familiar with and preach on myself. What was a revelation was the sense that we shouldn't just try to emulate Peter, or Mary or any of the other disciples, but to be like Jesus.
Its so easy to settle for being like Peter or Mary. They are wonderfully human, make endless mistakes, pick themselves up again and continue to follow. They are reassuring and set us a high, but somehow achievable example to follow. But Jesus, that's a whole new story. And yet if we are to be his disciples, who else should be attempt to emulate?
Easter Day began pre-dawn with the most amazing service of the year - you have to be really committed or really mad to make it - but 12 others did, and together we celebrated the resurrection of Jesus, lit new fire, renewed baptism promises and then shared coffee and Italian Easter cake [the HCB's having disappeared].
We ran out of pews and just about out of chairs at St Andrew's at 10am, the crowns, cross, choir and coffee and cakes were great, as was the worship of which they were all a part. Thank you to everyone who created it.
And then home to cook lunch for 8 and afternoon tea for 16 [for Alice's 4th birthday]. I think that some also turned up for my 35th [on 9 April] but that's depressing and reminds me of a friend who expressed concern that I was looking tired, and my hair was getting greyer! Or another who said that I was going to be on the slippery slope to 40!
Have a great Easter week everyone.
The Easter Garden at St Andrew's - made by Sue and lots of children at St Francis on Good Friday.
1st April, 6.25pm
'No pudding for a week for Groanup's' so wrote Anna this morning, 1st April. It was then inserted as a news release inside the daily paper for her parents to read! It didn't fool us for long - but I love her spelling of grown-ups - what does it say about us all! Talking of April fool's nothing happened at church - either from me or anyone else - we missed a trick.
One more thing this week - I've mowed the lawn and cleared out the garage! Its big news, I promise you. The garage particularly has been virtually inaccessible for months and has been on my to do list for just as long. And now its clear there's a vague chance of me sorting my paints and starting to fulfil the four commissions I have outstanding - but don't hold your breath - some of them are already two years old.
I'm sitting out in our front garden [thinking of a glass of wine] as I write this - everyone else has gone inside, complaining of the cold, but its great to watch the sunset. And as Beth's doing evensong - thank you Beth - I have a rare Sunday evening without a service.
BLOGGERS NOTE
You'll notice in this blog that I use clauses and sub clauses and square brackets and lots of other grammatical aberrations! Also that I can't spell. Jane sometimes compares my sentence structure to St Paul, going on and on and on... I'm afraid that you're going to have to live with it. I try to edit it all out when I'm writing for print, but I'm going to indulge myself here.