I have decided to share some thoughts about some of the stuff that I did at Greenbelt as being a good post-modernist I think all of life can be treated as "a text" and therefore can be read and so if I "read" it then it should feature in this blog...
First up was Blesséd an alt worship / fresh expression group described in the programme as "outrageously incarnational, rabidly Anglocatholic and wildly inclusive" who were offering Eucharist@home in the Big Top. I find Blesséd a fascinating group as I strongly believe that a highly sacramental approach should work as a fresh expression and yet on the basis of this service I have serious doubts (to a lesser extent this is also true of their offering at last years Greenbelt).
The geography of the space clearly didn't do them any favours - the altar was up on the stage and behind a very solid crowd control barrier (think Laudian altar rails writ large) - but they didn't do themselves many favours either - as while the acolytes, crucifer, and thurifier came down into the main space for the entry procession the dozen or so Priests who were to concelebrate the mass didn't. I can see no practical reason for this abnormal deviation from processional etiquette.
Another issue I found problematic was while there were some beautiful words spoken about brokenness and the gathering of the broken around the altar I struggled to connect the highly choreographed presentation with the pain and confusion we were being told was so central. This is partly the decontextualising of action that occurs when worship is taken to festival and offered as a company of strangers rather than as an outpouring of community life. Linked to this was one thing I found especially puzzling, which they did last year and again this year, is have sections of the liturgy prerecorded. Some of it was, or at least had been made to sound like, that of a child but most of it was Fr Simon Ruddel the principle celebrant. I don't know what they thought this brought, but exchanging a the voice of a real person stood in the room for the disembodied prerecording of them certainly didn't help foster a feeling of connectedness.
As a final point of Blesséd, we were given pots of bubbles as we arrived and asked to blow them during the confession - the interpretation of this was not completely clear - were we to see that as the words of confession were spoken and we expelled air from our lungs into the bubbles so we also expelled our sinfulness? But then the Big Tent slowly filling with beautiful bubbles was metaphorically filling with sin and that just doesn't seem to be the right metaphor at all.
After Blesséd I when over to see Show of Hands and really enjoyed their upbeat folky sound with just a little bit of politics sprinkled in.
Outerspace a group that comes together to provide stuff at Greenbelt about being a Gay Christian and the first session this year was about finding a Spiritual home - it took the form of a panel discussion with four of the members of the group sharing their personal experience of Church and how being gay had changed their relationship with it. For 3 of the 4 this involved them going on a journey to a different type of Church or beyond the boundaries of Church, for the other one it seemed while he had stayed put his home Church had been on a journey (with the metaphors of death and resurrection coming to mind). It is always a privilege to hear people speak so openly on what are personal even intimate aspects of their lives. One thing that was interesting was that all 4 (two non-alined Evangelicals and two Roman Catholics) had had fairly intense experiences of Christianity within the home as well as at Church growing up - all mentioned "family prayers" for example. So while I grow up in a Vicarage it was one in which the very idea of "family prayers" was treated with a mix of suspicion and ridicule, where we never said grace, and Morning Worship on Radio 4 was the only thing switched off more quickly than the Archers. Maybe this is the natural effect of having the Church next door - any praying that needed doing could be done quite easily there. I think this isn't a question of right or wrong but understanding the seedbed of your faith tells you a lot about how to make it grow.
I think I should of course mention that the text most heavily read during Greenbelt was the Jesus Arms where not only do I love the beer but all the beautiful people with whom I talked such profound rubbish :)
Wednesday, 31 August 2011
Thursday, 25 August 2011
the church as as life-giver and life destroyer by Nicholas Mosley
This extract is this week's Literary Companion to the Lectionary and it really spoke to me - I hope you find it thought provoking too.
The rules in one sense are that which have been found to give framework, reference, order; that without which there can be no freedom because there could be nothing to be free within or free from, there could be no movement in a vacuum. But in another sense they are that which brings petrifaction and death. In Christian terms it is the church, the institution, that perpetuates (is the manifestation of) the rules - both as life-giver and life destroyer. In a sense the church is opposed to everything a free man stands for: it is that which Christ fought and which fought Christ: the denier of truth, the torturer of the honest, the servant of mammon. All this is too much felt now to go on about it: the concern of the church for power, respectability, vanity, money - its obsession with sexual morality and disregard for any other - all this, it is obvious to everyone except Christians, is just what stops other people being Christians and will go on doing so. But still, opposed to this, there is preserved in the framework of the church (how else could it be preserved?) The truth of the story, the history, the art, the secret. The church is that within which the possibilities of the freedom are held: through which is transmitted, beautifully, this experience. (How else could it be preserved except in something so paradoxical?) Within the rigid and self-seeking church have been the things that have given the chance to alter everyone.
The rules in one sense are that which have been found to give framework, reference, order; that without which there can be no freedom because there could be nothing to be free within or free from, there could be no movement in a vacuum. But in another sense they are that which brings petrifaction and death. In Christian terms it is the church, the institution, that perpetuates (is the manifestation of) the rules - both as life-giver and life destroyer. In a sense the church is opposed to everything a free man stands for: it is that which Christ fought and which fought Christ: the denier of truth, the torturer of the honest, the servant of mammon. All this is too much felt now to go on about it: the concern of the church for power, respectability, vanity, money - its obsession with sexual morality and disregard for any other - all this, it is obvious to everyone except Christians, is just what stops other people being Christians and will go on doing so. But still, opposed to this, there is preserved in the framework of the church (how else could it be preserved?) The truth of the story, the history, the art, the secret. The church is that within which the possibilities of the freedom are held: through which is transmitted, beautifully, this experience. (How else could it be preserved except in something so paradoxical?) Within the rigid and self-seeking church have been the things that have given the chance to alter everyone.
Saturday, 13 August 2011
The Woman at the window - Tweleve Stories by Emyr Humphreys
The Woman at the Window: click to buy on Amazon
This is a strong collection of short stories by a confident and accomplished writer. It is perhaps unsurprising for a collection published in honour of the writer's ninetieth birthday that the theme is often reflective - it is peopled by those looking back on lives with a mix of fond recall and regret - while there is some darkness it is far from doom laden.
To quote the last paragraph of the final story which sums up the mood of the whole:
"History made me, but I'm no legend. All I can do is accept the joke and carry on protesting. Whether or not is means anything, without having any effect. I shall never know, unless I find out after I stop breathing. But at least it's my life. It was given to me. I have no other."
These stories are little gems, tightly written and while covering only a dozen pages or so crafted as complete narratives. There is an exceptional realism to the characters, with members of the older generation taking centre stage in most stories - not relegated to the 2-dimensional window dressing that is the case is so much fiction.
This is a strong collection of short stories by a confident and accomplished writer. It is perhaps unsurprising for a collection published in honour of the writer's ninetieth birthday that the theme is often reflective - it is peopled by those looking back on lives with a mix of fond recall and regret - while there is some darkness it is far from doom laden.
To quote the last paragraph of the final story which sums up the mood of the whole:
"History made me, but I'm no legend. All I can do is accept the joke and carry on protesting. Whether or not is means anything, without having any effect. I shall never know, unless I find out after I stop breathing. But at least it's my life. It was given to me. I have no other."
These stories are little gems, tightly written and while covering only a dozen pages or so crafted as complete narratives. There is an exceptional realism to the characters, with members of the older generation taking centre stage in most stories - not relegated to the 2-dimensional window dressing that is the case is so much fiction.
Friday, 12 August 2011
Soothing Music for Stray Cats by Jayne Joso
Soothing Music for Stray Cats
I found it hard to work out if I liked this book or not and I am still undecided.
The protagonist is in the midst of some kind of mental disturbance - himself suicidal he has to deal with the suicide of a childhood friend he has lost touch with. Through this the book takes as a major theme the guilt felt by those around a suicide that they weren't able to prevent it. This is challenging stuff and very easy to get wrong and yet Jayne Joso, in her debut novel, handles the material well. This is a sensitive book clearly in tune with the despair and yet also the desperation to cling on to life that so often rub up against each other.
That said, while the general ark of the novel is commendable there were a number of things about the style that were weak and irritating. For example the narrator/protagonist's roots in the generic 'North' are denoted by his use of 'me' instead of 'my' - yet as a whole the story is not told in a dialect and this becomes a mere linguistic tick that simply serves to jar the reader not immerse them in a reality. The is also heavy allusions to books and songs which I think hinder the narrative more than truly help it along or expanding it - the exchange of Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino for Mrs Dalloway by Virginia Woolf (here described to indicate Northern charm as 'a bird') is a key event in the story yet for me, having read one and not the other, the significance of the exchange is lost.
What I hope is that this is a glimpse of potential, a first novel that is a success not a triumph, and which will be followed up by better things to come.
I found it hard to work out if I liked this book or not and I am still undecided.
The protagonist is in the midst of some kind of mental disturbance - himself suicidal he has to deal with the suicide of a childhood friend he has lost touch with. Through this the book takes as a major theme the guilt felt by those around a suicide that they weren't able to prevent it. This is challenging stuff and very easy to get wrong and yet Jayne Joso, in her debut novel, handles the material well. This is a sensitive book clearly in tune with the despair and yet also the desperation to cling on to life that so often rub up against each other.
That said, while the general ark of the novel is commendable there were a number of things about the style that were weak and irritating. For example the narrator/protagonist's roots in the generic 'North' are denoted by his use of 'me' instead of 'my' - yet as a whole the story is not told in a dialect and this becomes a mere linguistic tick that simply serves to jar the reader not immerse them in a reality. The is also heavy allusions to books and songs which I think hinder the narrative more than truly help it along or expanding it - the exchange of Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino for Mrs Dalloway by Virginia Woolf (here described to indicate Northern charm as 'a bird') is a key event in the story yet for me, having read one and not the other, the significance of the exchange is lost.
What I hope is that this is a glimpse of potential, a first novel that is a success not a triumph, and which will be followed up by better things to come.
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