Something Imaginative

It’s strange how pastoral situations sneak up on you.

For those that don’t know what a pastoral situation is, it’s a preistly buzz word for a situation in the community that you can answer in some way, hopefully with the Good News of the Gospel. Or in other words, a situation in the community that needs “investigating”, or “fixing”.

There I was in Chapel, wandering around during the sharing of the Peace like I always do. I always offer my hand to anyone, and smile with a soft nod of understanding at anyone that doesn’t take my hand. Not everyone likes the sharing of the Peace. In all fairness, before I came here, I’m not sure I did. It has, however, grown on me (some of my fellow in-mates here would say “like a rash”).

As I wandered around, I came to someone who I knew had been upsetting some of my friends. Conciously, I chose not to offer my hand. The person in question wasn’t looking didn’t know. However, to my surprise, I did know.

I decided I would talk this over with a few friends of mine here, and their generall response has been that it’s wholy my problem. My only methods of fixing it were in some way to try to get the person to see the error of their ways, to in some way justify my unchristian act.

Much to my surprise this has stuck with me. I can’t come up with any suitable way to express precisely how it is that I feel about this. It goes against the grain, even though what I know about this person makes them….. not very nice in my eyes. This problem has, apparently, always been a problem in the college. Recently, however, they have been turning on their friends, and attacking them. This reached a head recently when they thought that they could no longer cope. It was at this point that I dearly wanted to get myself involved somehow. To tell this person that if they wanted to come and talk, if they wanted some help, that my door was always open. I didn’t do this. I didn’t offer him the sign of peace.

This is a difficult thing. It’s something that we should all be trying to do, and I’m here trying to learn to be a leader of people. To try to set a higher example for others to follow.

The problem with this means that my reasons for trying to help this person my actually be entirely selfish. I’m trying to fix my own guilt by turning the problem onto them. Everyone has assured me that getting involved at this stage is not a good idea, the person is in so much trouble, and is the kind of person likely to try to take people with him when the excrament hits the fan.

Knowing all that, however, doesn’t mean that I know what to do about it. I don’t know how to talk to him, or how to reach out to him.

A thought occours, which is why I suppose we’re told to wright these Theological Reflections. I could send him an email. Worded carefully enough, it could simply be me offering an olive branch. This would hopefully absolve me of the problem that I did nothing, and also it would mean that I have tried to live up for this impossibly high image that I have of myself.

I do awknowledge however, that perhaps I should re-visit this idealised image of myself. It may be too impossibly high, which will mean that it is unatainable, and I will explode in the attempt of reaching it. Then again, it may be just right, and though it may be unatainable, trying to live up to it may be the best thing I can do (baring in mind that as a Christian, I should be striving to be more Christlike). I suppose that this episode just goes to proove that I’m only human. It is this kind of thing that I need to take to God in prayer, to ask for forgiveness for.

I will see if I do anything, or if I can find a way out of this situation. Right now, as often happens in life, I need to be at a lecture. No doubt this problem will drift out of mind.

Some parts of me know that the best thing to do is to do nothing, in the political mine field that is the Church. Some parts of me know that this person will be much better off experiencing life before returning to re-seek their vocation. They don’t know enough of life yet. That can’t be fixed in the time they have left here. Though the part of me that is often referred to as a “pink fluffy heart” needs to know that it has done something. I don’t have a hard edge, perhaps it’s time I aquire one.

~BX

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It’s amazing how often we forget. Somtimes we don’t say it when we should, sometimes we say it in passing, in response to something she said, or even out of habbit.

Sometimes you say it just before you go to sleep, forgetting that it’s not just something you say. Though the words themselfs are comforting, the feeling of really telling someone, of holding onto her for no reason at all, is one we shouldn’t forget.

So, stop what your doing right now, and go and do it. Step away from the computer, go and find her, and just hug her. Hold her tight, tell her you love her, and then kiss her. Wander back to the computer if you like, but tell her. Tell her now.

~BX

NOTE: You can also substitute him in the above.

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Regular readers of this blog will not be surprised to find yet another post about the things that I have stumbled up on the internet. They may, however, be surprised at the contents of this post.

This is a story about a lady named Irena Sendler. She doesn’t have a Nobel Peace Prize. Nothing so surprising about that. Many people don’t have a Nobel Peace Prize. She, however, is credited with saving some 2500 infants and children from the Natzi’s during the second world war. She’s a mostly unknown figure, her claim to fame coming when four high-school kids from Kansas wrote a play about her called “Life in a Jar”.

During the Second World War, she got a job as a plumber to the Jewish Slums, and used to smuggle children out either in a burlap sack in the back of her truck, or in a fake bottom in her toolbox. She wrote the names of these children down, and kept them hidden in a glass jar that she kept in her back garden. She passed away age 98 of pneumonia in Poland on the 12 of May, 2008. She’s not known about because no-one wrote an academy-award winning film about her.

She saved all those lives. She doesn’t have a Nobel Peace Prize. She is probably one of many unsung heros and heroines from the Second World War. No-one knows about them, so they don’t have a Nobel Peace Prize.

Yet somehow, Irena Sendler managed to get nominated for one. At least, it is commonly thought that she was. The nominees are kept secret for fifty years, so hopefully I will be able to verify this story then. Even if she wasn’t nominated, she should have been.

She didn’t get the Nobel Peace Prize. Al Gore did. Al Gore got a Peace prize for his documentary “An Inconvenient Truth”.

I would say that the inconvenient truth is that people today have forgotten the horrors of the Second World War. We only see the documentaries, that is, we see them come up on TV, and turn over to find something else. We know it was bad. We don’t want to be reminded. It’s inconvenient.

I wasn’t born anywhere near the world war. I hear of war all the time on the T.V., but I don’t really understand it. I have this concept that “war is hell” because the T.V. tells me so. IF you do remember the war, tell someone. If you don’t remember the war, find someone who knows and ask them about it. Get them to tell you why it is so important we never forget. Why it is so important that we never, ever again let that happen to our world.

The end of the Second World War was meant to be an end to war. That went well, didn’t it?

Irena Sendler doesn’t have a Nobel Peace Prize. There are at least 2500 people who are a alive today because of her. The Natzi’s when they discovered her broke her arms and legs, and tortured her. She wasn’t the only one they tortured. She wasn’t the only one that tried to do something for the people who were being horribly persecuted.

An Inconvenient Truth has a Nobel Peace Prize. In this world, today, right now, there are people suffering. There are people being tortured, people being subjected, living in tents. There are people doing everything they can to help these people to rescue them. We don’t know who they are.

We found out who Irena Sendler was. She didn’t get a Nobel Peace Prize. She didn’t get one, because we’ve forgotten. We’ve forgotten the sounds of the air-raid siren, the noise of the bombs, the terror, the fear. The watching for the letter to drop on the door mat to tell us that our Dad, our brother, our son isn’t coming home. We have forgotten because the world is a little better. They made it a better place for us. They paid a terrible, expensive price. They paid the ultimate price. Their families paid the price. Do we remember how much it cost?

We didn’t honour Irena Sendler. We hardly know about her, about the others like her. We don’t care. We don’t want to remember. Our inconveinient truth is that we can’t face our own fear, we can’t face the horror that was the Second World War.

The least we could have done was give the woman a Nobel Peace Prize. At least in some way we could have shown her that we are greatfull. Not just to her, but to everyone that hasn’t got one and should.

The world has forgotten so quickly. Will you?

~BX

source: Snopes

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There is a Black Man in the White House.

It happened, November the 4th, 2008.

A day before the UK celebrates a man who tried to blow up parliament.

Barak Obama now has the eyes of the world upon him, his family, and the new dog he promised his daughters. He doesn’t just have to heal a country on the brink of bankruptcy. He doesn’t just have to try to get them all working together, and bring about a more equality to a country that still heavily remembers black oppression.

He needs to show the world he is not another Doubleya. He has got to show us that he can find the places he wants to attack on a map. He has to show us that he is more than just a man of once wonderful speech.

He can not screw this up. He can make mistakes, he will have to make some unpopular choices. He just can’t screw up. I, like many of the world, was relieved that it was him and not McCain/Palin. I don’t think he’s about to start randomly attacking places that don’t exist.

He has a lot of damage to make up for. A lot of things that he has to get America forgiven for.

God Bless Barak Obama.

Heaven Knows He’ll Need It.

~BX

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The strange thing about Christianity is that as members of the religion we are called to be rational about our faith. We are meant to be able to say what kind of a world that Jesus lived in, to have some idea of the text and context of the Bible, and to be aware that there are parts of it that are dependant on the time it was written, and who it was written two.

We are called to investigate, understand and digest our Holy Book, and to know some of the prevalent themes therein. We also have a vague understanding of Church History, and how some of the things that we believe, and that we don’t believe have come about. Where our statements of faith have come from.

There’s no real mystery around the New Testament. You can find explanations about it all. You can even find explanations for all the Miracles or Signs. Some explanations simply change the nature of the Miracle, that Jesus walked out on a causeway, rather than walked on water, yet others, (Barbera Thering: Jesus the Man), claim that the whole thing is an encoded event that was part of tradition at Qumran.

Christianity is often attacked for it’s seemingly illogical acceptance of the impossible. Other Nature Religions are made exempt from such a burden of proof, presumably because little is understood about them, and that they, for the most part, keep themselves to themselves, and most of their tradition is passed down orally. You can, of course, buy books alluding to some part of it, but for it to make sense you require several books, by several people, and to learn from others. Other branches of the followers of the great “I AM” have their Holy Books shrouded in some form of mystery. the Koran can only truly be read in it’s original form, the Torah is kept wrapped in special cloth and kept in a special box. By contrast, you can buy a Bible anywhere.

Christian Worship has changed too. The Mystery of the Worship has been all but removed in some Churches. No-on remembers why a Church is built with the alter facing east, and many people won’t have noticed that old graveyards people were buried with their feet facing east. The words of the liturgy have changed as they’ve been revised, slowly removing superstition after superstition. Sometimes even the Communion Service is marginalized in favor of a service with electric guitars and drums.

There is a “Charismatic” movement (Charism meaning Spirit, the word meaning, literally, “Full of the Spirit”), which tries to retain some of this mystery in a new way. It concentrates on the “Gifts” of the Holy Spirit, which means talking in tongues (talking in what is presumed to be an “Angelic” language, or an ancient forgotten language), interpretation of this language, the discernment of spirits, and healing. They concentrate on a strange phenomena of feeling that they feel during these services. A skeptic might point to the fact that this is due to the large bas speaker throwing out an unusually strong beat. That coupled with the singing produces a feeling roughly similar to that found amongst American Indians, and some African tribes during a war dance, or rain dance and so on. Perhaps this is a way of getting the mystery back, yet the methods used to seem to make those taking part vaguely ridiculous (It also gives rise to yet another form of Christian snobbery, those that have been given a “Gift” by the Holy Spirit, and those that haven’t (NOTE: This is not true of all Charismatics)).

Another problem facing Christianity is the fact that it was only 2000 years ago. This means that we can find tantalizing evidence that sheds yet more light on the time. There are contemporary writings, and written history about this period. There is also the chance that we might yet find more documents, like those found at Qumran. This closeness, the fact that we could almost prove that Jesus really did exist rather than simply believe he did drives some people who are looking for what they feel is a missing part of their faith. The proof that they feel they need.

Could this missing part be the lack of Mystery? A lack of “Magic”? a lack of something… miraculous about the religion. It is difficult to marry a personal God and Saviour with a Global one. We may know that we have seen Jesus working in our lives right up until something bad happens, and then we wonder if he ever existed at all for this bad thing to happen. The amount of expectation that we, as Christians, have in our God far outweighs what we perceive to be the realities of life. Others, who have an inclusive view of their God, that is, it works for them, or for the chosen few don’t have this difficulty. Their view of God is not expected to answer why the Hurricanes, tidal waves, or earth quakes happened somewhere else. The victims were not chosen, not of their god, heathens, or perhaps that land is the real of a different god.

Christians believe that it’s all God. That God is a loving parent who looks after us. Things like natural disasters… confuse things. We have long put aside the idea that God would need to be appeased through some ritual to avoid more Tidal waves. We have no way of making ourselves feel better about these natural disasters because we’ve painted this view of God that doesn’t seem to match what we see in the world.

If we brought the Mystery back would it help? or would is simply making for lazy theology? In the case of something like a natural disaster, we could answer something like “God moves in mysterious ways”. It doesn’t seem to fit the missing piece, however.

Is the feeling that we’re missing something proof that we have ahold of the wrong stick? that perhaps Christianity as a religion is somehow flawed? As logical as that conclusion would be, it also doesn’t match with the experience of a Personal God and Jesus. This leaves us in a strange place somewhere between the logical and the illogical, emotional parts of Christianity. Perhaps what’s missing is the logical link between these two differing parts?

Perhaps the link that we’re missing is the mystery. Perhaps it’s somewhere in that divide.

Whatever it is, we will know when we find it. If we’re going to be looking at our religion, if we’re going to be taking it apart, investigating it’s Historical context, as well as criticizing the form used to wright it, perhaps we should also look at the intentions behind it. The Miracles that Jesus and his Disciples were seen to do, and wonder, where is that knowledge now?

~Black Xanthus

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A friend of mine found this, and thought of me.

I’m not quite sure what to think about that….

~BX

The Image is from eatliver.com

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Background:. While listening on a sermon based on the reading from 1 Peter 2:1-12, the Vicar told us that we didn’t really need vicars, because we are all called to be members of the Holy Preisthood. He also went on to say that Baptists have a better graps of this than anyone.

This annoyed me, but I can see the poing. Perhaps that’s just an example of Church indocrtrination. There is call for all people to be members of the Holy Preisthood, as was once given to the tribe of Levi in the Old Testament. This was then expanded to be all the people of God. John Calvin said something similar when he arranged his churches, saying that the important thing was that the Word of God was being preached truly.

So, then, anyone is called to be a member of this Holy Preisthood, and the only requirement for membership is the moving of the Holy Spirit. They, by being preists, are able to administer all the sacraments, to perform Marriages, Baptisms, and so on. In today’s world, of course, those sacraments that have a legal edge such as Marriages and Deaths require a registered person, so for the sake of this discussion we’re just going to take those sacraments that are only “religious rituals”, such as the communion, baptism and the like.

The thurs of the argument put forward seemed to point to an ailing church, and saying that when it fails, (it may have been if, but the thrust seemed to be when), there will be no more vicars, and so how will a faithful congregation be able to consecrate the bread and the wine? the early churches didn’t require vicars, indeed, the position didn’t exsist in the begning. Churches were just a collection of faithful people, trying to honour the death of their Massiah. If it was ok for them, then why do we need Vicars? and, conversly, if we need Vicars, does that mean that all those churches that allow lay people to bless and administer the sacrament are not partaking in a true communion? Or those churches that do not have a line of ascendancy, as is claimed by the Anglicans and Catholics all the way back to Peter, are not truly Holy, or partaking in Holy Communion?

Instinctivly, I know that there needs to be Vicars. I also appreciate that there need to be Baptist Pastors. So what we have, then, is people called by God, and “set appart” by God (a frase you learn as you going through Anglican Selection) for this office. The strong thing that I’ve seen from my interactions with the Baptists, and from within my own tradition is that there must be a sense of calling to the role. This calling is then discerned either by elders (as in the case of the Baptists), or by other Vicars and lay people (as in the case of Anglicans). So is this the “Royal Preisthood” to which Peter says everyone is called too? I don’t think so, at least, perhaps, not anymore. The description that was given in the Sermon, was of anyone who thought that God was calling them to administer the sacrament would simply step forward and do it. The implication seemed to be that it wouldn’t be the same person over and over, and this seemed rather reminicent of what I know of the Quakers. That seems all well and good, but for some reason doesn’t seem to work for me. I have said in other places that I am Christian by accident of Birth, and I would guess, then that I’m also Anglican by accident of Birth. Perhaps the reason that I feel, instinctivly, that there needs to be Vicars is because that’s what I’m used too, perhaps from another tradition, I would be training to be a Pastor, or, perhaps, a Rabbi. I am interperating what I belive to be my Calling from God through a lense coloured by my life and perceptions, as I guess God has intended it.

It doesn’t really explain why it annoyed me. I think it was the Hypocrisy that probably wound me up. Here was a Vicar, standing in front of the congregation saying that all of them were able to do the job he was doing, and this was something that he strongly believed, and the end of the Sermon didn’t come with his resignation. By putting on the Dog Collar, you accept that you believe in the office for which you stand. Yes, you will disagree with some of the doctrines and dogmas of the Church, but you still, intrinsically, belive in the Church herself. If not, then your not an Anglican (or Catholic etc.), so you have then stepped into the realms of hypocrisy. This then means that you are making a mockery of the entire system. I have heard people speak out against doctrines, against the way the church responds to situations, against the political and structural elements inside the church, but I don’t think I’ve every heard anyone speak out against the church itself.

Is it, perhaps, an element of wounded pride? after all the struggle and hard work, and all the effort that I will need to put in over the next 5 years to be told that it’s all unecesssary, does that shake my pride at the achievemnts that I’ve made so far, at my view of self-worth? does it challenge my world view that those that are called are in some, undescribable way, slightly……different from everyone else? I suppose I havn’t really explored the idea of “different”, having simply accepted the term “set appart by God” as being a sufficent description. We’re not better than anyone else, we’re not, in some way, more “elect” than anyone else. It’s just the calling that God has given us, in the same way some are called to be Doctors, Teachers, Parents, Mechanics, Shop assistants, and so on. I suppose, than if everyone is also defacto called to this preisthood, then my calling is irrelevant. That would be an entire reflection in and of itself. I don’t think my calling is irrelevant, and I think at this stage, that kind of thinking (that my calling may be irrelevant) may seriously destabalize my world view.

There still seems to be one last thing. It’s the idea of what happens during the communion (or any of the other sacraments, but this is the one everyone is familiar with). Either it’s just someone saying some words over some bread and wine as a memorial to Jesus, or the bread and wine is blessed, and in some way becomes a symbol of Jesus’ presence and glory hear on earth as a continuing sign of his sacrifice for us (or something along those lines.). If you believe the former, than I would guess that anyone could do it. They are just words, just rememberence. If, however, you believe the latter, then it follows that the person that is being the channel for the communion must have the spirit moving in them and through them. Is this something that everyone can do? I’m not sure they can.

But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people,…..

It says in 1 Peter 2. Does he mean here preisthood as we understand it today? I don’t know. Reason, however, tells me that he does not. We are all called by God to administer his Word in some way, either through our lives, our example, the things we do in Church, the way we are in our daily lives, the way we simply follow the commandment about being good to one another. This, to me, is the “Royal Preisthood” that Peter talks about.

Suffice to say that the preacher did not follow his Sermon with a surprise resignation. I don’t know if what I’ve picked out of the sermon was what he intended. I don’t know if what he intended to preach was about the death of the Anglican Church, it’s dwinding numbers, and the fact that in his mind the world doesn’t need Vicars.

That is, however, what I left with. If that summary of his sermon is not what he intended, then it highlights the danger of wrighting sermons without trying to look at them from the outside. Sometimes people arn’t on your train of thought, and their train head off a different way to yours. If it is what he intended, then I think the lesson I have learned is that there are somethings you never share in a sermon.

~BX

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For those that have been wondering where the recent blog updates have vanished too, I’ve been away at the ordinand college of St. Michaels in Llandaff. As my previous post points out, the internet connection there is a little… lacking. It’s taken me all week to get over it, I mean, the shock of having to resort too.. *cringe*.. pen and paper!

The week has been long and tiring. The routine has been a hard change, up in time for 7:45 Morning Worship, followed by breakfast, and then into introductions to the whole program formation for Ministry. Lunch at 12:30, and then back for more introductions. A final service, either a eucarist, all age worship, prayer meetings, or evning prayer at 5:30. There is also a compline on Monday and Wednesday at 9:30, but these are optional. We have to make 2 services a day.

The most important thing that we learnt was about having to wright reflections. There has been so much to reflect on this week, from the feelings of being deskilled, to being overwhelmed by the change, and of being surrounded by a large number of people who knew a lot more than me about leading worship.

The early mornings are killing me. That and not being able to sleep properly while my body clock adjusts from the late nights and late mornings to this new, early morning, early evening sleeping routine. As you can see from the time of this post, I’ve still not got it right.

With a bit of luck there will be some reflections up over the week as I make myself walk down to the library to post them online. Ahh, the love I have for my non-existing readership.

Keep reading, and with a bit of luck, this blog might get a bit more interesting.

~Black Xanthus.

Addendum: I found this interesting idea about what precisely it is that Jesus died for. A lot of people have difficulty with the idea that he died to remove “Original Sin”, being as Original Sin is based on the story in Genesis, and doesn’t seem to make sense to us all these years later. It’s and interesting perspective, and yet another thing that I may need to wright a reflection on.

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Dear and Faithful Readers, it’s time for a change.

Not a big one, but one that’s meant to help me further my investigation into the Religious. To that end, I’m adding a new category to this blog, entitled “Reflections”. These are a collection of thoughts about a subject.

A bit of background, I suppose might help. As an ordinand in the Church in Wales, we all have to fill out a protfolio. This is an interesting item of work, where we have to explore those areas of Ministry that you can’t really “prove” with some exam or other. We are to find little bits of information, to think and to “Reflect” on experiences that we have. These are then to be drawn together under a collection of headings to prove that particular item.

I would list them here, but I’ve not brought the protfolio home with me. The reason that this item hasn’t been put up sooner is that the internet provision at St. Micheals College is… well… the Church in Wales all over. It’s only available in two rooms, and even then the coverage is a little flakey. There was the idea that this year they would be starting a renovation project that would put cabled connection into this room, but the cost was prohibitive. They were also going to extend the wireless network, but someone told them a few… untruths, and that was also deemed expensive.

This is a situation that I’m working on.

~Black Xanthus

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More a quick post that will interest my Wife. I found this picture while wandering through the internet.

Entertaining, isn’t it?

Maralin Monroe, often thought of as being nothing but a pretty blond, here seen reading one of the most difficult books, Ulesses by James Joyce. Not one I have personally read, but as Rosslyn is going to be doing her dissertation on James Joyce, I thought it might interest her.

~Black Xanthus

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