Consultation

I have had a cough/cold now for over a week and so I am still punctuating everything I say with a… cough.  It’s half term which give me opportunity to catch up on a few missed days off. 

There was quite a bit of discussion this morning at church about the three sculptures that have been submitted for the square.  Two are a bit phallic and one is a bit boring seemed to be the verdict but they haven’t seen the full set of documents yet nor met the sculptors so hopefully there’s time yet.  The biggest criticism is that they are not very Christian or more precisely they are not explicit enough in their symbolism.

This is a hard one… is St Paul’s Cathedral explicitly Christian?  A church tower, a spire a Celtic cross which many claim is pagan in origin.

“We don’t want to have to explain it to people” someone said.

It’s going to be an interesting few weeks as we “consult” which is the latest euphemism for having a friendly row!

Doing our best

It has been a week of meetings trying to hold everything together.
It takes a lot of energy to do this. Much of this work would be greatly helped by everyone involved assuming that everyone else involved was actually trying to do their best.
We are trained to be suspicious of each other by the media, by our culture, and sadly by our experience of being let down. It's part of the Christian discipline to forgive and begin again and one which I will continue to have to practice.

Niggles

A niggly kind of day...
The heating is off for its summer holiday and those who have cast a clout even though May is not out are complaining at the cold in church.
"why are there not double sinks in the kitchen?"
"because we have a dishwasher."
This is afternoon things improve with youth group spending a cheerful couple of hours planning a prayer space upstairs in the new hall.
Then off to visit my son Ben in hospital, a bit sore and a lot miserable at a post operative infection raging through his body. At the end of the visit he is able to walk us to the lift and give us big hugs. Once again I am struck by the way in which the sick care for the well.
Now I am back at church enjoying a concert by really good amateurs and reflecting on the beauty of the church and valuing space and stillness in a mad busy day.
I have just won a coffee cake in a raffle, life is improving!

Democracy Matters

To Huddersfield to hear David Steele, a great old political warhorse. "Education is the key to propper democracy" being one of his key themes. Each country has to find it's own way of doing democracy. It made me think about Yemen and whether there could be a tribal way of doing democracy... In this country real democracy could do with being as localised as possible. Where town villages and cites still have meaning and force in people's lives then they should be the places where decisions are made.
As we become a less mobile population we might need to return to the concept of the parish.
Top quote for the evening belongs to Harold Wilson in whose name the lecture took place.
“He who rejects change is the architect of decay. The only human institution which rejects progress is the cemetery.”

Benchmark

A weeks holiday in Cornwall and it's back to work with a bump and flurry of activity centred on the hall project.
The square is beginning to take place and I am currently sat on one of the new benches in the sunshine drinking ginger beer and wondering if life gets any better.
This morning we have been with the finance people from Yorkshire Forward thinking we may need to do the hard sell on what remains of the project... As it turns out unnecessarily as it turns out what has so far been achieved sells itself.
The next big task, as well as finishing is to learn how to make this work. Like people moving from a pushbike to a Ferrari it's going to be hard to raise our game, but our journey so far encourages me to be hopeful.

An Inconvenient Truth

Holy Week is never easy for christians , not for what you might expect although it is a month of Sundays.
Okay a week of Sundays!
Rather because it makes us face up to two aweful truths, our sin and what it cost Jesus to deal with it.
What's hard for me is not so much the dying but the suffering of Jesus...
It goes on and on like a car crash in slow motion with us helpless spectator.
It's Friday but Sundays coming!

Code of Silence

I am destined to blog while waiting... Today I am in Nathan's barbers with a queue of seven slighlty reluctant men. There's no coffee, no flowers just a slightly foggy goldfish bowl and a rare collection of car magasines.
We sit in silence and try not to catch one another's eye. Forty minutes have passed already and nobody has yet to break the code of silence.
My phone goes and I have to answer... Catherine is in a café but I am holding my ground.