Today was mission project day. For the past 6 months as a group, a few of us have been putting together a presentation to answer the question

What is a missionary church in the 21st Century?

The presentation to the rest of our year group and the external examiner went really well. All the presentations from each of the 6 groups were unique and great works of collaboration.

The experience has been great. On occasions it has been hard work, but on the whole it really has been a pleasure working with this wonderful group of people. In only 6 months we have grown to love and trust each other as well as work together on a pretty good presentation.

It’s great to have new friends and I hope they will continue beyond our time at the SEITE community.

Quote of the day:
‘sometimes we may need to throw the baby out with the bath water; sometimes we do need revolution rather than evolution, sometimes we play too safe and need to push out with new ideas … which means chucking out old ones!’ (David Peacock, external examiner)

A good day yesterday on different models of church, ending with a look at the fresh expressions video and a discussions based around it.

Exciting to see and hear fellow ordinands stressing how important it is to either to seek to develop new forms of church or bless and release other people to become involved in fresh expressions. It can be both as well of course.

WE had evening prayer in the crypt of Canterbury Cathedral and came across an excellent art installation for Lent, ‘All Flesh is Grass‘ by Charlie Miller. This is excellent installation of 300 perspex casks and well worth seeing if you are in the area.

This work celebrates the tiniest of objects of creation in Britain’s most important ecclesiastic building. The Dean of Canterbury, the Very Revd Robert Willis said “Works of art help us to reinterpret the spaces of this amazing Cathedral Church. Canterbury has long been associated with pilgrimage and this work shows the imprint of many human lives passing through this place. It is illustrative, not only of the Parable of the Sower, but also of the pilgrim path to Canterbury.”

A great surprise to end the day.

The day then ended with another table football competition and alt whisky tasting!

Quote of the day:

The church should be the true Israel; a blessing to the nations. Are we a blessing to the community we find ourself in?

Don’t “if” your life away..if i was…, if i had…, if i had the opportunity…, you’re you! God doesn’t work on ifs…we’re each on our own journey, God wants an army of people committed to going where He wants to take us as individuals… BE A FIRST RATE VERSION OF YOU, NOT A SECOND RATE VERSION OF SOMEONE ELSE….

Great stuff here from Katie.

Katie has reminded me that I am here to be me. There is a temptation on this residential to be someone else just for an easy life – but God has put me here to be me!

Quite a cool day!

The day has been varied and fun.
This afternoon we had the pleasure of the company of Rabbi Jonathan Magonet who spoke well on Judaism and gave me some new insights to the bible. He particularly took us through the 10 commandments, which actually are called 10 sayings in the original Hebrew and are not the importance crux of rues that we seem to have made them. More of that in another post!

This evening we were set free to worship in Canterbury. A number of us went to St Mary Bredin, some out of curiosity and myself for a more comfortable style that I can relax with. The service was great, loads of young people bringing words and pictures – but not surprisingly this was not everyones cup of tea. And, in one way, that is the beauty of the Church of England. She expresses herself in a variety of ways and somehow we all hold together in a healthy tension.

A few beers and whiskies, a good dose of football on Sky and now off to bed as morning worship is at 7.30. I may be there, but I need convincing that God is awake then for prayer himself!!!

Best quote of the day ‘do we give people want they expect in church first, or give them what we feel they should have?’ by Angela Shier-Jones.

I missed the game- but we won!
Four games in a row – I don’t thin we’ve done that since around 2001!
53 points … surely the Gills are staying up!

How cool is this – I can blog from Kings School, Canterbury as I have a CAT lead and my room has a LAN connection. I guess this should be expected if you pay well over £7000 to send your child here.

The school is set in the grounds of the cathedral and if I walk out the front door I am about 10 strides away from the cathedral. This is such an amazing place to be. It’s a real privilege to be here, but we are all conscious of the cost involved in being here. It’s only Saturdayy night and I already miss Sarah,Tom, Beth and Joe! Others are missing their loved ones too.

I’m staying in Linacre house which use to be the home of Nelson’s brother, and apparantly Lady Hamilton danced on tables here! Maybe I’ll copy that before the week is out! Maybe not!

The first day has been ok – a good lecture from Paul Bradshaw, and some good worship in the crypt of Canterbury Cathedral. He suggested that in the western world we have concentrated too much on representaional acts of easter, ie acting out the crucifixion in the same way we act out the Christmas story. I think he is right when he says we neglect the resurrection as we concentrate on the death. Instead of the 12 stations of the cross, what about 12 realities of resurrection?

I think Bradshaw has a point. We do over emphasise the crucifixion, and I think at the sake of the resurrection. WE don;t want to swing the other way – we need to re-establish the both and. The centre of our faith is the death AND resurrection of Jesus, not one or the other!

Tonight I even managed to escape the organised quiz night (me and organised just do not fit!) and went with just a couple of people, Jeremy and Nicola, to Simple Simons, agreatt little pub with good beer a great jazz band. I’m sure I’ll visit it again before the week is out!

Looks like the blog this week could be a good reflection for a week at vicar training school, which is far easier than filling out the paper journal I’m supposed to do!

My lovely car passed the re-test this morning which I thank God for.

I had to drive the car 100 miles to clean the engine with chemicals and get it warm enough to pass the emission test, which it did comfortably.

Irony … 100 miles worth of diesel and cleaning agent pumped into the atmosphere just so the engine can be passed emission wise … no sense there!

Oh well … I’ve just said goodbye to the boys as they go off to watch (hopefully) another Gills win, I kissed the girls as they go off to Bluewater to spend lots of money, and I’m now off to Easter School in a perfectly legal car!

Have a great holy week – if any of you are passing Canterbury, why not give us a bell?

Tomorrow sees the start of something I really have not been looking forward to.
Part of SEITE training involved an 8 day Easter School in Canterbury which starts tomorrow.
I’m sure it will be great when I get there, just 8 days is a long time to listen and do stuff, when all I want to do is chill at home over Easter.
It will be good to see friends and stuff though on the course, and we get the odd lecture from someone called Rowan Williams which should be cool.

There’s also a good few bars and coffee shops in Canterbury if I can manage to escape!
I return on Saturday 15th (which happens to be my 41st birthday – so go click that Amazon wishlist link!) so a good day to be coming home to Sarah and the children.
Not too sure how I’m going to get there if my car fails it re-test though! God’s gonna do a miracle at 11.30 tomorrow!

I’m not sure wireless has hit Canterbury yet – so this space will probably be quiet for a week or so – but you never know …

It’s been a week of highs and lows, cancelled meetings, mad travelling … but it’s been great!

Lowlights
Leaving the house at 5am in the dark, and returning at 930 pm, still in the dark!
queing for 20 minutes to get on the tube at Victoria
cancelled trains!
my car failing its MOT just on its emission test (I hope it passes tomorrow after a long drive!)

Highlights:
Having Sarah and the children join me in London and go on the London Eye in glorious sunshine and seeing the look of amazement on the childrens faces as they looked out across London.
Celebrating our wedding anniversary at The Barn in style.
Spending a great few hours with Martin Mant, and later Carly, (who always turns up at lunchtime!),from Solent YFC.
A brilliant, if long, meeting at Head Office to hear of everyones exciting plans.
Meeting the baptist youth workers along with Lev over lunch.

The day has been hectic and I long to be one of the people in the centre of this picture, resting as the world rushes past, relaxing un-noticed in a haze of speed, a little haven in the chaos of 21st century life.

Sadly, today, I have been one of the people rushing through in the car, staying nowhere very long, noticing very little of what has been going on around me, and getting as fast as possible from A to B, then from B to C, and so on.

It’s been one of those days where there is too much to do and no time to do it. I’ve failed to do all I want to do today, but I’m giving up as I need to go to bed so I can get up at 5am to drive to Halesowen. At least the roads will be empty – I hope!

(BTW – the picture is not mine, and I can’t even remember where I found it now, but if you recognise it, let me know so credit can go to the right source).