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CREATING COMMUNITIES OF WHOLENESS WITH CHRIST AT THE CENTRE
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22nd November, 8.50am
Well its been a while, for which I apologize, but life and everything else kind of took over post Canterbury. And I just wasn't remotely in the mood. Canterbury gave me quite enough opportunity for reflection which then didn't want to go away! So I stayed off line to avoid deluging you all.
One story and one thought for now though.
The Story: On our first day in Canterbury we were set a learning exercise, to imagine that hoards of angry Bristolians were about to invade the Cathedral Close and we needed to assess its entrances, exits and their general defensibility.
Well, here I am, four days later - to finally complete the post! Sorry but I'm not exactly in a bloggable/bloggish [do such words exist, or will they exist in a few years?] mood at present.
Anyway, back to Canterbury and the entrances to the precincts. We went round in small teams, and as part of our explorations we asked the security personnel - how many gates, of what kind, where, when are the open, can cars get through? etc. etc. After at least one conversation with a bemused guard, I remarked in response to his obvious confusion 'well you see, we're planning an invasion'.
We went back, reflected on what we had learnt, how we had learnt it and how we would do it differently another time. And then we forgot all about it.
Until the next day when the head of security came in and revealed that our exercise had triggered a rise to the highest level of security. I can claim no knowledge of the mind of a terrorist, but I really don't think that if I'd wanted to attack the Cathedral I'd have explored in quite such a chaotic or public way.
And then the thought. The first night in Canterbury we had an amazing candlelit tour of the Cathedral. we ended up at the site of the shrine Thomas A'Beckett. Throughout the middle ages pilgrims used to travel to Canterbury - Chaucer's pilgrims were just a few of the hoards. Today we often talk of a journey of faith and think of it as going from A to B. But the mediaeval pilgrims went to the shrine [in Jerusalem, Rome, Canterbury or any number of other places], and then they went back.
A journey of faith isn't just a pilgrimage from A to B, its about encountering God at your destination, allowing God to change you, and then traveling back home again, taking God with you and allowing your encounter to change how you live. Because God isn't separate from 'the rest of our lives' he's there right at the centre of them, if only we'll let him be.
3rd November, 7.30pm
Isn't it meant to be your day off? was the greeting when I walked into St Francis - yes, but... Its been a manic week, and still a fair amount to do, so this is a short entry, unless I get waffling. But that's the price you pay for going on a week long training course in Canterbury - which is where I'll be all next week. Its all about leadership and is run by the International Leadership Centre or some similarly scary place - we'll see how it goes.
I can see and hear the fireworks out my study window as I type this. And tomorrow at Lydiard Park I'll join thousands of others [and millions across the country] as we burn the guy and celebrate his planned explosion. Granted that he was one of the first suicide bombers and I never want to condone murder, but don't you think that, 350 years later, we should have made some progress on forgiveness. Do we have to execute him again!
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.