Abbey House Quiet Day

Got this message from Abbey House, Glastonbury today. Now nobody minds being given an unexpected  free day but if you fancy a day's peace and quiet in the company of Luke 15 then why not book in, if you're able to.

Monday 9th May - Quiet Day "Lost people matter to God" with Rev Steve Tilley

If I am being honest there are two reasons why I want to ask you to consider coming to the above Quiet Day at Abbey House. Yes, one reason is that if we don't get quite a few more people booking we will have to cancel it, and I haven't cancelled a Quiet Day yet! But the second reason is just as true - if you don't come you will miss some great input from a very talented speaker and a chance to enjoy the very special peace of Abbey House and its gardens to recharge your batteries!

Steve Tilley's Twitter blurb says he has been "disorganising religion since 1975" and his blog describes him as "possibly the most or least normal vicar you will ever meet". Not convinced enough to come yet? Talking about the input for the Day he asks "Is God more like a partying shepherd, a dancing house-cleaner or a bad dad light on discipline?"

Why not come and debate this with Steve or just enjoy the peaceful surroundings of Abbey House and the great lunches we provide?

Book by calling 01458 831112 or emailing info@abbeyhouse.org

Yours sincerely

Rob Norman
Director

I Love the C of E

I do, I do. In all its wonderful mix of stupidity and glory, I love it. Here's an example:

I have been the minister of a planted church for ten years, Although every church in the land was once planted, the idea of church planting has controversial overtones for some.

Trendlewood Church was planted by Holy Trinity, Nailsea in 1989 (Palm Sunday) to be a worshipping presence and attractional model of church in a part of town which used to be fields and became housing development.

There are only three public buildings on the estate called Trendlewood and the church has met in all of them at some time or other - two schools and a pub. There is no available land on which to build a meeting place.

Anxious to assert its own vision and direction in ministry the church spent the year 2014 seeking guidance regarding its future mission, concluding that it was called to be more independent; in fact as independent as possible.

The Diocese, through its officers, indicated that Trendlewood could not become a parish without a building and so Trendlewood has sought the maximum possible independence within this restrictive framework.

Last night the Holy Trinity and Trendlewood Annual Parochial Church Meeting (APCM) affirmed the proposal to pursue this by a massive majority.

There are very few examples within the National Church with which to compare this. Even the part of the C of E's web-site dealing with unusual pastoral arrangements has nothing directly comparable.

So, if you had to give a name to this new, exciting, emerging, unusual expression of church what would you choose?

Maybe a group of people who had spent too long switching their computers off using the start button had a propensity to give names that are the exact opposite of the style. So yes folks, if it all goes through without a further hitch, we will be:

A Conventional District

Can you imagine how much I want to insert the letters U and N prior to the second word? Yes, that much.

Thought for the Day

As delivered at BBC Radio Bristol this morning:

How do you make decisions? Do you arm yourself with the best possible information then sit down with a cuppa and go through the details? Or do you act on hunches? Have an intuitive sense of what's wrong and what's right?

Should you vaccinate your children? Are the warnings right? Which experts should I listen to? Do I believe what I read in the papers? How do I assess risk?

And what about the relaxing things I can do that may involve substances? Cigarettes? Coffee? Beer? Nitrous oxide? Is it my decision? Should I listen to advice? Does it affect my decision if they are legal or illegal things?

Should I get fit? How? Train for a marathon? Or should I perhaps start on the easy level of a fun-run?

But have you noticed that a lot of life is about decisions? Have you heard of the Bible book of Job? Did you know that after questioning God, asking why he had suffered, apparently for no reason, the book ends with four chapters of God's questions?

Who is this that darkens my counsel? Where were you Job when I laid the earth's foundations? Who laid its cornerstone while the morning stars danced together and the angels shouted for joy?

What answer do you think Job gave after hearing a hundred such jibes? Did he own up to questioning things beyond his understanding? Or did he stand up to God and voice what he thought?

Do you think I'm going to tell you the answer? Or have you noticed, in this age of personal decision-making, that every sentence of today's thought is a question? Is it me that does thought for the day? Or is it you?

The Happiest Days of My Life?

Richard Garner has been the Independent's, and more recently theipaper's education correspondent for many years. He has now retired and last Thursday wrote a fascinating retrospective on the changes upon which he has reported. I put the article on one side to consider again.

Find it here.

He notes some things of tremendous interest.

I had, for instance, forgotten that the abolition of corporal punishment in schools in 1986 was passed by only one vote. Mrs Thatcher, who would have voted against the measure, was delayed in traffic. Nice to know that traffic congestion isn't all bad. And it reminds us that Thatcher was not really a reformer at heart - she was a keep-it-as-it-is conservative in oh so many ways. Had she got there she would only have delayed the inevitable. Can't imagine the Major government ignoring such an issue, especially once they had their own mandate in 1992.

He records that the arrival of literacy and numeracy hours in the early days of the Blair government under David Blunkett's management was also a great drive upwards in standards. I reckon that the 1997 Labour Government (or New Labour as we must now remember not to call them again) had been sitting on its hands for so many years (eighteen in fact) that it did all its best work within eighteen months.

He applauds independent scrutiny of schools, noting in passing that the current chief schools inspector is proving too independent for Michael Gove's liking. The 'I thought we were friends' line ain't working. Academies will get just as much of a pasting under him as any LEA controlled school.

With some back-bench revolt afoot the current government, Garner says, may struggle to get their academisation legislation through.

And he ends with this:

'...treat teachers as professionals, not guinea pigs for constant change. After all, you wouldn't dictate to a brain surgeon how he or she should do their job, would you?'

Thanks Richard Garner. You have educated me.

Photos

Married in 1977 we have a book of twenty wedding photographs. Yes. You heard me. Twenty. I have a lot of special memories about that day, mainly because I got to concentrate on it.

There's an article knocking around from the New Yorker. It suggests that in the future we will only look at things in order to photograph them.

I have in my possession one photograph which worries me immensely and tells me the danger of such a future.

Two weeks ago I baptised a couple of lads at church. It was a great experience and the crowd (outside on a cool March morning) watched and cheered. I baptised by immersion in a large paddling pool.

Now such a baptism involves carefully, and pastorally, making sure the candidates are fully under the water. I try not to scare them or bully them.

But one photo clearly shows me holding one lad underwater by the throat. There can be no doubt. 

Except there is. Because the crowd will tell you I did not do that. It is a passing shot. It caught my hand moving position and froze it. And there lies the danger. Not from photoshop, although that is dangerous enough, but from thinking you have captured reality when you have created it.

Try and record reality with your own eyes and brain and then see if the photographs remind you of it. This ship may have sailed.

Grumpy Old Curmudgeon

One Christmas my Grandfather - a man for whom the word dour may well have been invented - took the opportunity to moan to one of my uncles about his Christmas present the year before.

Take a moment to think what sort of person does this. Firstly he delivers a complaint about a gift and secondly has waited a year before doing it.

'That fridge thermometer you bought me last year. It doesn't work.'

'That's OK' said my uncle (a bloke we called uncle but not a real one) with a smile on his face, 'I've bought you another one this year.'

Now tell me how you feel about this if I tell you this. He was the MD of a firm that made fridge thermometers.

Given that I have (I am told) a generous nature and a cheerful disposition it says a lot about the strength of the genetic material on the other side of the family.

Gig Openings

I was fortunate enough to see Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers touring their first album in Birmingham in the 1970s. Hyped up for an evening of exciting rockage we wondered which of their great up tempo tracks they would open with. Maybe American Girl or Anything That's Rock n Roll.

He chose Lunar.

Now this is a great song. Listen to it here. 

But as a show opener it was remarkable. It is filled with expectation and in the trembling vocal contains the idea that something big and loud is about to break out. It leads you to the rest of the album (which the band then played). But the song is all angst. It felt like the tune played over the PA as the lights dimmed rather than the first of the gig. Only after it had finished were the crowd addressed. Quite brilliant.

Thinking about it for no reason the other day I got to pondering the best openings to gigs I could recall. And they are all quite a while ago. Maybe beginning a gig isn't quite what it used to be. Too much ambling on, 'Hello Bristol' (or wherever) and then playing. So how about:

Genesis at Reading in 1973 began with Watcher of the Skies. A huge brooding organ-filled sound. Peter Gabriel, only his head visible, eyes painted with luminous make-up, was encased in a sort of box. As the song progressed it was raised hydraulically into the festival night sky until he sang the final verse twenty feet above the stage. It was outrageous theatre only slightly dampened by the failure of the hydraulic mechanism and it taking about ten minutes to get him down again. I used to get terrible stomach cramps in those days, a mysterious late teenage thing that disappeared as mysteriously as it came. I had one that night but I can only recall the opening of the gig not the pain I was in. I like that.

The following year I saw Jethro Tull at Birmingham Odeon. The lights dimmed and a single spotlight picked out a black and white clad guitarist riffing on a black and white guitar. He was soon joined by a similarly clad bass player (what happened to stage costumes?). This guitar and bass dance around the stage continued for a while until the rest of the band joined in and we were off. Can't remember the tune, or much of the rest of the gig, except the pictures still in my head forty two years later.

In 1987 I saw The Mission at Rock City. Midway through the first tune I realised I had experienced the perfect iconic rock moment. To a mighty drum beat three, wind-machine-assisted, long haired guitarists were standing with one foot on a monitor surveying the crowd. They each had a fag hanging out of their mouth as they played Beyond the Pale.

I would add one further gig which I have only seen on DVD. Deconstructing the gig idea totally David Byrne (who else?) chose the Stop making Sense tour. He walks onto a bare stage with a huge ghetto-blaster and says 'I've got a tune I want to play you.' He presses 'play' and the drum track to Psycho Killer is heard. This is Talking Heads' best known song and usually their encore. He plays it solo, on acoustic guitar. Over the next two hours the band turns up section by section, a back-drop is added and by the end (the beginning?) there is an orchestra, visuals and everything you need for a great opening.

Your turn.