emergent
kiwi
In Liquid Church, Pete Ward takes a deep swim in postmodern waters. While many are just trying to dog paddle, Ward explores ways for the church to incarnationally flourish in our contemporary culture. At times the theologian in me wonders if Ward’s theology is so liquid he ignores Divine person, and thus the importance of gathering. At times the practitioner in me wonders who will fund Pete’s dreams. But the insights around spiritual desire and the creative and missional possibilities around shopping for meaning are worth the price alone. It is a provocative book in which the missionary heartbeat is undeniable. The book is well written. It is concise. It handles well. If you’re serious about being church in the postmodern world, it is worth taking the plunge.
liquid church
Coming:
Olive Drane, creativity and the image of God
Christchurch, January 04
Going:
Taylor's to Chch, Jan04
Church and Society, Auckland, Feb04
Stuff I've written:
Celebrating a Postmodern Pentecost
Sketching a postmodern missiology
Romeo/Juliet/altworship
DJing salvation
Piglet reads the Bible in a postmodern world
Coupland/community
cultural
wildflowers
1 Peter:mysogynist
or feminist
New generation/new
millenium
Church
in a global world
My further reading
art and spirituality
church ministry
postmodernity
Generation X
popular culture
gospel and culture
faith in aotearoa new zealand
Conversations that enhance me:
andrew jones up close
small ritual
douglas rushkoff
jonny baker
God-n-
club culture
paul fromont
darren rowse
Christian greenie
God-n-club culture-2
human in london
intellectually gritty
rachel cunliffe
jordon cooper (mentioned my blog 3x)
mark barkaway
Interview with:
Archives:
June 2002
July 2002
August 2002
September 2002
October 2002
November 2002
December 2002
January 2003
February 2003
March 2003
April 2003
May 2003
June 2003
July 2003
August 2003
September 2003
October 2003
November 2003
December 2003
January 2004
Monday, September 30, 2002
Today is World Vegetarian Day. I've been a vegetarian for about 15 months now. A number of us at Graceway are. It's a healthier, cheaper and more environmental way to live.
For me, the main reason I'm vegetarian is in response to world poverty. You can feed more people from one paddock growing beans and chickpeas than one paddock grazing cows. So if we changed our diets and ate less beef, there'd be more food for the world. Now I know that my diet today is a drop in the ocean of burgers consumed this minute. But its one way for me to live differently in response to a God who loves this world.
A recent Third Way article concluded " When we see the relationship between the Eucharist and the food economy we remind ourselves of the connection between our own consumption of food and global ecological and justice issues ... But when the local worshipping communities reconnect the Eucharist with ecological justice and the food economy ... they give visible shape to the good news that the trouncing of the powers that threaten life on earth is not only a past event but one that is constantly breaking into our present reality."
posted by spirit2go team at 7:01 PM
Friday, September 27, 2002
My webblog has just made its first book sale. Paul Fromont emailed saying that he's just brought Stories, Stories, Everywhere after I recommended it on the blog a few days ago. Enjoy the read Paul, its a very practical book that is great for those who actually want to tell stories and not just live in the abstract world of narrative theory. It makes me wonder if I should become an Amazon subsidiary!!
posted by spirit2go team at 9:46 PM
Gave my paper on church as weblogs, portals, open source code yesterday at the University of Auckland. A lot of work went into it over the last few days and it came together really well. Lots of positive feedback and people asking me when and how I will get it published. Not sure yet. It's a blend of sociology, of internet, of theology. So I'm not aware of a natural home for it.
posted by spirit2go team at 9:35 PM
Wednesday, September 25, 2002
It appears I'm not the only one thinking about church as blogs and open source code. Check out this;
Can We Talk? "Open Source" Judaism with Douglas Rushkoff
posted by spirit2go team at 2:14 AM
Today is the celebration of Sergius of Radonezh. Born in 1314, St. Sergius of Radonezh came from a once-wealthy family. He established the monastery of the Holy Trinity. It was one of forty which he founded. He created several monastery schools and taught farmers better methods of farming.
Very cool. Planter of spiritual communities. Integrator of faith and farming.
posted by spirit2go team at 1:52 AM
Tuesday, September 24, 2002
I've been reading The Cloister Walk. Its about life in a monastery. I'm doing lots of thinking about the monastic life and about what those daily disciplines of spirituality would look like in the foyer of a new millenium, and in underpinning an arts and spirituality collective.
Came across this quote;
Augustine was a wanderer for 30 years, attending worship, backing off for it and the community and the church. But he kept returning and the result was that Augustine found himself being baptised.
30 years moving in and out of community. I'm in such a rush. I want salvation for my mates yesterday. What does it mean to give them and God space, to create places where people can wander in and out, to ensure that community and spirituality is sustained over the years.
posted by spirit2go team at 4:27 AM
Monday, September 23, 2002
I'm stufffed. In the last 24 hours I've curated worship, preached, lectured for 3 hours and lead a 2 hour storytelling workshop. Most of my upfront commitments all pushed into a very intense time.
A highlight was M. She pushed her way into church. We eat together as part of our commitment to community. She didn't want to eat, just to look at the images. Church was laid out with a single 5 metre high pink flower rear projected. Off to the left was a yellow Trinity (3 wicks in one) candle and another rear projected smaller Colin McCahon art work. She just sat, claiming space for about 5 minutes. Thanked us and left. Don't know where, why or how, but it was neat to be provided an ambient and visual context that could nourish her in her journey.
posted by spirit2go team at 3:34 AM
Friday, September 20, 2002
Quiet day today. Worked on my Church as open source or blog paper. Visited sites like open office and open source theology.
Went into town to pick up the video loops of church on Sunday. We're looking at all roads lead to God, and so TV 3 gave us their opening to the 6 pm news, which has NZ road images and we've looped that up as background visuals.
posted by spirit2go team at 10:10 PM
Thursday, September 19, 2002
I need an image of takeaway coffee. Anyone out there got one?
Email me please graceway@ihug.co.nz.
posted by spirit2go team at 2:45 PM
Church as open source or blog. Next week I am giving a paper at the University of Auckland.
I want to argue that church in the New Testament was influenced by culture. They met in synagogues or in houses or early in the morning beside the river because that made sense in light of the way their culture worked.
So I then want to explore how our culture works. I want to use the internet as a window onto firstly, how the search for meaning today is individualized (what works for me) and secondly, participatory. I want to use the concept of portals and blogspots and open source code as examples of offering individualized searchers the possibility of finding meaning together.
I then want to ask what it would mean for our churches to become all things to all people, to meet individualized searchers where they were at, while offering egalitarian, participatory community. Church as blogspot or open source code, and the advantages and disadvantages of the metaphor.
And finally I want to return to the Apostles Creed; We believe in one holy apostolic church, and argue if my project is heretical, or in fact a contemporary example of a global, connective, inclusive community.
Any comments? Any helpful articles or websites you can offer me, especially re portals, blogs and open source code. In return I will quote you in my paper.
posted by spirit2go team at 2:43 PM
Tuesday, September 17, 2002
This week is clean up New Zealand week. My partner has a plastic bag attached to the pram, and as she goes to school to pick up our 5 year old, she picks up rubbish. 3 cheers for practical discipleship
posted by spirit2go team at 4:31 PM
Monday, September 16, 2002
Second storytelling workshop night last night. It was just GREAT. All over the room, people in pairs were telling stories, of God at work in our angel moments, our dark forest moments, our landmark moments.
Then they had a go at re-telling the Bible stories before pulling back to discuss. The key question;
Q. Is it harder to retell Bible stories?
A. Yes.
Q. Why?
A. Because I haven't been there. With my own stories, I experienced all the detail. Not so with Bible stories.
Q. So how do we find the detail in Bible stories.
And so we talked about the use of Bible atlases and commentaries. So to retell Bible stories actually requires us to go deeper into the Bible world. Isn't that cool? That the creative process of storytelling takes us closer to God.
Next week we build on this. We'll look at using our imagination to get into the Bible world. I'll keep you posted.
Two books I've find really helpful have been Stories, Stories, Everywhere and Clowns, Storytellers and Disciples.
posted by spirit2go team at 5:25 PM
Today is the celebration of the life of Hildegaard of Bingen in the Church Year. Theologian, healer, musician and founder of an 11th century monastery. I have found her very helpful over the last few years. There's an article on her in the latest Reality by David Crawley.
I was struck by her use of crystals in healing. I kid you not. If God made the earth, then as a Christian she used the energy of the eath's crystals in healing. That really stretched my thinking.
Secondly her insights into the greening of God. That just as our world is full of energy, for growth, for life, for vitality, so God wants to be at work in us for life and growth and vitality. Sin is framed as our denying this greening of God. I love the way this 11th century person links an ecotheology with personal life transformation.
Thanks God for Hildegaard,
May my life this week be connected to the sap of Your vitality,
May my roots search out the enzymes and proteins of your Spirit life.
May my life be moistened by refreshing spirit streams
posted by spirit2go team at 5:12 PM
I ran some potential building scenarios past a denominational friend. My ideas for a cafe and spiritual portal and art collective. The response was guarded and the final comment made, "is there anyone within Graceway who can run this". The intent was good, but it felt like Graceway's building needs are Graceway's problems. Which fits with Baptist philosophy. You got an idea, you go and do it. But does it really cost the heartlands?
I have a friend who wants to set up an art and spirituality space. She's after funding for her wages plus building from her Denomination. Which sounds heaven to me. It's secure and it costs the heartlands. BUT, how reproducible is this? How many denominations can give buildings and money.
Do you see my dilemna? How healthy is it for the new to rely on the old? What will true partnership look like? What does sustainable and reproducible mission look like when the rubber hits the funding road?
posted by spirit2go team at 3:30 AM
Friday, September 13, 2002
September 14 is the anniversary of the first Maori baptised in New Zealand (1825). I’d like to see more people baptized at Graceway. Over 50% of our membership are twenty somethings re-professing faith, people who come to us and become active in our life after significant times away from church attendance. In the US, that’s characterized as unchurched, people who have not been attending church for a year previously. So Graceway is scratching where it issues among dechurched postmoderns.
But NZ has 40% of our population who have no religious affiliation. And we’ve only seen one of these baptized, and another couple profess faith. My prayer is for a steady stream of postmodern spiritual seekers, who have no religious affiliation, find faith. And that’s such a huge challenge because they just don’t walk through church doors or hang around on the fringes or have any positive attitude toward Christians (else they wouldn’t be unchurched postmoderns!).
Please God.
posted by spirit2go team at 3:05 PM
Mulholand Drive. (Warning: Don’t read this if you haven’t seen the movie.) It seems to be to be a great exploration of the human condition and our ability to reinterpet life in our own image.
The way the dream scene reimagines the main character as so sweet and innocent, arriving from the country. The way she is passive in the affair, but was the one most deeply in love. Oh, and such a great actor. The way the woman she has an affair with has potential “mob” connections and so is potentially tainted with evil. The way the director is being pressured by dark mysterious forces to choose the main actor. So his choice of her partner is not his real love showing. The homeless man as an example of her twisted persona.
posted by spirit2go team at 3:03 PM
Wednesday, September 11, 2002
I've just added to this blog some of the articles and stuff I've written. Hope them links all work!
posted by spirit2go team at 2:42 AM
Storytelling workshop training was great. 11 people, 3 churches. We started by telling the story of our rings, our earrings, whatever was on us. Amazing how deep and vulnerable we became. Telling stories sure creates community.
We've identified at least 5 uses for stories; in conversation, in writing, in public telling, in the public telling of written stories, in the retelling "live" of Bible stories. All ways to fund the imagination, to provide alternative ways to think and be.
posted by spirit2go team at 2:20 AM
Monday, September 09, 2002
From the Alternative Alpha Course;
My friend can't stand Christians because they're intolerant and fight amongst themselves
Why are Christians so intolerant and hard on each other?
What does the comment mean for how Christians live and behave?
posted by spirit2go team at 8:05 PM
What have we learnt since September 11th?
to judge your neighbour by their skin colour.
to discriminate against your neighbour because of their country of refugee origin
that discrimination against refugees makes for good politics and party gains
that religious fundamentalisms, both Islamic (courtesy of Osama bin Laden) and Christian (courtesy of Mr Bush), are dangerously attractive.
that the Isaiah (2:4) vision, of the settling of disputes among nations and of turning swords and spears into ploughshares and pruning hooks (resources for economic development), remains just that: a vision.
posted by spirit2go team at 2:46 PM
Sunday, September 08, 2002
Storytelling course starts tonight. Our lives are stories. The Bible is the story of God. So we're taking the time (4 consecutive Mondays) to become better storytellers. We'll look at structures, imagination, the telling, the listening. We'll have lots of time to practise stories. We'll have a local storyteller, Simon Brown, join us to tell a story a night and how stories are born for him.
Last year someone offered to preach at Graceway and came back to say that they just couldn't do this preaching thing. But they did have a story. It reminded me of how "tight" are our communication boxes at Graceway. Hence the storytelling course, a way to open those boxes.
Also visiting the Good Craik Club in Edinburgh was an awesomely spiritual and creative experience. But that's a story for another night!!
posted by spirit2go team at 10:34 PM
Thursday, September 05, 2002
Postcards from the edge
A book that explores ways of being church in a postmodern world. A book that explores practices and that provides resources for groups wanting to surf postmodern mission waves. Some theory will be evident, but more to resource new ways of being in extended cultural analysis. Feature stories from NZ, Austalia, USA, UK. Include hyperlinks (visuals, poems, use of Bible, worship rituals).
Chapter 1 - God in video loops: Incarnation
Chapter 2 - Spirituality portals and community
Chapter 3 - God Installions: Creativity dowloaded
Chapter 4 - Beyond the condomisation of Christianity: Environmental ethics
Chapter 5 - Church as DJ: Culture samplers
Chapter 6 - New ways of leading: new ways of following
Postscript: A Postmodern creed
Market: Those doing postmodern church, those wanting to do church and those wanting to understand.
Release date: once I finish my thesis!!
posted by spirit2go team at 10:50 PM
Tuesday, September 03, 2002
Our Father, who is in heaven
working so hard I never see him
Hallowed by your name
and so distant I never see your emotions
Your kingdom come, Your will be done
with a strap, when I broke the rules
Give us this day our daily bread
But you did bring home a pay packet
As we forgive those who sin against us
And drunk it with your mates at the pub
For yours is the kingdom, the power and the glory
After all, you’re the head of this house and you’ll do what you damn well like
Amen.
PS This has got nothing to do with my parents or my personal experiences of God. Rather it is an exploration of the confusion that can result from poor parenting when combined with images of God parenting.
posted by spirit2go team at 3:04 PM
Monday, September 02, 2002
after gender wars
I got so much positive feedback from my rant about marriages that I've posted it on the graceway website.
posted by spirit2go team at 7:26 PM
On Friday I will meet with someone who, like me, dreams of an art and spirituality centre. We will drink coffee and see if our dreams might resource each other. Andrew Jones put me onto this article about creativity cities.
In recent years new kinds of creative laboratories have emerged … aided by technology and the growing ease of travel, more artists and thinkers are congregating in smaller, far-flung communities around the world. .. Now just as culture has become decentralized, so has creativity … These funky towns can be found in the most unlikely places .... The forces that draw artists to these unusual locales are also the same. "They come to live life to the fullest, to be a ‘player,’ to be where the action is, to walk the streets and feel what’s it’s like —to be on the edge of what’s possible." … One truism that still holds is that creativity emerges from chaos. Disorder has a way of shaking up old ideas, pushing people to take risks, making them see things in new ways. … Another, more unfortunate spur to creativity is the yawning wealth disparities that are growing in many parts of the world today … Historically, all these meccas have also had something more prosaic in common: cheap rents, at least in certain neighborhoods .... All this is kindling, though. What’s needed is a creative spark to fuel the rise of a genuine community. It could be the arrival of a great name or the development of a cafe culture or the founding of a new art school.
Can a church be this spark? How do we know if we’ll be this spark? And who pays the rent if the fire doesn’t lit?
posted by spirit2go team at 2:47 PM
Sunday, September 01, 2002
Elitism.
I spoke on 1 Peter 3:1-7, wives, husbands on Sunday. A very difficult text. I got heaps of positive feedback, the most ever from a sermon and I'll try to get around to putting it on the web.
One comment though was really interested. She thanked me for what I said and how putting the text in its original context means for the first time she can read that part of the Bible without feeling angry and frustrated. But that simultaneously she felt disempowered. That she doesn't have the time for study and so she can never gain those insights herself. So parts of the Bible might always remain obscure.
Very interesting point. Is preaching a form of elitism? What does original context mean for eveyone accessing the text? What to do with those obscure bits of the Bible?
posted by spirit2go team at 3:32 PM