Lent days 4,5&6!!!!!

So trying to blog daily while on residential just proved to be too much.

Residentials the bane of my life.

For three days I carry the primary responsibility for everything involved in co-ordinating a residential for 58 women and children. I had this weekend the complete luxury of having a truly great team and a really big thanks goes out to Pinky Fly, my beautiful girl and a cool Ballycastle boy.

On Saturday I escaped for a magical two hours to watch Ireland thrash England at Croke Park. I watched the game and especially in response to the dignity with which the National Anthems were sung, knew that I was watching a piece of significant Irish history.

Sunday brought sickness! Yuk!

This was the foreground of my life this weekend but it is the immediate background that preoccupies my mind.

The conversation upon which I am reflecting much is:

What is the nature of bullying?

What makes bullying sectarian?

Does it depend on the motivation of the bully?

Does it depend on the language of the bullying?

Is it dependent on how the person being bullied hears it?

I have no coherent answers as yet if indeed there are any definitive ones but this is the conversation that will most probably preoccupy my background for the foreseeable..

Lent day 2

So today I watched two films and had lunch with my friend the lovely poet.

Several years ago I watched a film at the QFT called 'Roseanna's Grave'. It stars Jean Reno and Mercedes Ruehl and is a film about getting ready to die.

It quickly became one of my favourite films to the extent that I used it as a litmus test to see if male friends had any potential to move beyond that!! Watch out men most of my close friends have a litmus test film or song or place.

The last time that I watched it was when I was checking out whether my now and for always lovely man had any potential!

Shortly after that it disappeared off the video shelves and it only quite recently re-emerged on DVD as 'For Roseanna'. I ordered it 10 days ago and it arrived today. As I quickly unwrapped it and loaded it into the DVD player I was,I have to say very relieved, that I hadn't decided to give up watching DVDs for Lent.

Two hours later and a box of Kleenex I sat back and breathed a sigh of further relief, happy that my love of for Roseanna has not changed and, while being a film about death it is funny, gentle and still makes me want to run away and live in Italy.

Being set in possibly 1980's rural Italy, it is not surprising that intrinsic to the lifestyle of the main characters was their Roman Catholic faith and much attention is given to the rituals concerning death but more challenging Roseanna's belief that she will die when God wills it.

Several hours later and I am once again sitting in the QFT watching a film this time set in France in the Grande Chartreuse monastery called 'Into Great Silence'. For three hours we observe the life in the monastery through the changing seasons and rhythms of the lives of the Carthusian monks.

The film is punctuated by reflections and the one that jumped out at me was:

You have seduced me my Lord, and me
I have let myself be seduced.

Recently I have begun to reflect on the imagery of the church as the bride of Christ ,so maybe that is why this
stood out to me. Having been brought up through a church where conviction by sin is equated with being called by God the idea rather of seduction is both consuming and challenging.

In the context of Lent and the 'freedom to be' as I blogged about yesterday perhaps that is more easily understood and responded to, if I think about it as letting myself be seduced.

I wonder what that would look like for me. For the monks in the monastery it meant investing everything that they were, in observing the life of the order.

Much of the film, probably about 2/3 of it is filmed in silence and then every so often there are scenes where there is singing or talking which the monks were allowed to do when they went for a walk outside the monastery.

There is much beauty in the film and one fabulous scene when they are out for a walk in the snow and they start playing, rolling down the hill, knocking into one another. In that one scene it presented an image of -joyful penitence?

The film is three hours long but mesmerisingly beautiful. I have come away having witnessed men that have been seduced into a life that is foreign to me but completely natural to them.

And so on the second day of Lent I am reflecting on divine seduction.

Lent day 1

So Lent begins...

Throughout the day I observed men, women, children going about their business carrying on their forehead an ashen smudge.

I am trying to work out what this time might mean for me.

Looking at Sacred Space it speaks of Lent as:

the time of the year when the church invites us to test our freedom, and to question the notion: I can take it or leave it alone. Try that with grumbling, drunkenness, talking about yourself, stealing, gambling, or other habits that diminish our freedom. What habits make you hard to live with? Lent is about regaining control of our own lives, especially in those areas that damage other people. We don't admire those whose appetites or habits lead them by the nose. Nearly all of us have habits, or even addictions, that keep us from God, and harm both ourselves and others. These seven weeks before Easter help us to focus our energy on improving.

Putting Lent into the context of freedom challenges me to really think about the things seen and unseen in my life that impact my freedom and in looking at freedom to think further about it in the context of

freedom to do and be

and

freedom from

Freedom to do and be comes from an ease with yourself, or a level of self belief that results in not being held back by either people around you ,or circumstances and so for better or worse going for it and being the person you want to be

Freedom from ,is more about moving out from a place of bondage whatever that may look like.

Of course the two are closely linked and maybe freedom to do and be can only happen when there's no more bondage whatever that looks like.

The question then has to be in this context:

will a freedom from a love (no bondage involved)of chocolate and wine give me a further freedom will that give me to be or do something new?

So with that thought day one comes to an end,

no chocolate or wine has passed my lips

my first blog entry is almost complete

Will I keep this up?

Do I have the self discipline?

I suppose time will tell

Lent well not quite yet

So surprise surprise

My lack of self discipline is once more evident in my absence from blogging over the last few months despite renewing my commitment to it at the beginning of the year.

However that is going to change!

I have decided that for Lent I am going to blog every day.

I often think of blogging even when I don't, but it's a bit like the many birthday cards that I buy, write in, address and stamp but never take across the road to the postbox; it's not that I don't have things to say it's just that they often go no further than my head in the case of thoughts or my top drawer in the case of cards and even presents.,

I have heard and participated in a number of conversations over the last few days concerning Lent and how to observe it, if at all. I read in the Independent at the weekend of a women who intends to give up shopping in supermarkets and instead support local small shops. I am sure that this will be a challenge as it will no doubt consume more of her time and possibly money.

The only time that I have managed to do something that for me held the spirit of Lent was a few years ago when I gave up listening to the radio in the car and instead allowed the silence to facilitate a time of reflection and prayer.

I have at times tried to give up chocolate or wine or coffee though never all three at the same time, but somehow I suspect my motivation was more to do with addressing overindulgence than a pursuit of something more transcendent.

The question then becomes is self denial that may benefit one's physical state a true observation of Lent or is it only if self denial leads one to focus more on matters of the heart, spirit and mind
that Lent is truly observed?

My Lenten blogs will I hope give me the opportunity to take time out and provide a reason to reflect. At least that is my desire, because I'm sure that my mood will be less than up beat as I battle through withdrawal from wine, chocolate and all things good; well my body still hasn't recovered from Christmas and Lent does give me a good excuse to give it all up!!!

New Year 2007

So it's a New Year

Much has changed since my last encounter with this hectic heart.

Our building work is almost completed, only the wet room to be finished.
My family have been and gone with no real damage done.
Even my lovely man survived the demands of the holiday season which, to you who know him, will understand that, that is no mean feat in itself.

The days and nights are merging into each other with only slightly varying shades of gray in between but
do not fear as the new season of Desperate Housewives, ER, and 24 is about to make the winter nights more bearable.

I find the prospect of the new year an interesting one.
It feels like something has been born.
A year as i experience it has character traits, moods, colours and potential.
2007 will see at least four weddings of people I care about; one, that of my delicious partner and her photographer, will involve me in the role of bride's mate.
2007, I hope will also see the birthing of a delicious baby.

The one thing that i know for sure about 2007 is its life span. Already that is counting down. No matter how good or bad a year is, it does not go on for ever. It will not seem that long before what we welcomed in on New year's Eve, we will say good bye to on Old Year's night. Already there are 2007 dates that have been and have gone forever; 01/01/07 is a part now of history never to be repeated.

There are days from 2006 that i would love to be able to live again;
London in February with my boys
Barcelona in March with my girls
Paris in April with my man
Palestine with the poet
Listening to the Duke


and

there are days from 2006 that I will not grieve their passing.

So as I re-engage with this hectic heart my initial hope for this infant year is that i live it and not just watch it go by.
The only inevitable thing about 2007 is that it will end everything else is up for grabs.

Moving through

So the events of the last few weeks have preoccupied

my thoughts

my waking

and sleeping

hours

and many hours of conversations.

As yet there is still little

peace or resolution or even hint of it,

but

in order to move not on, as this implies a leaving behind

but rather a through, as this for me recognises that a process

started about 6 months ago when the faith community that

I was more than happy to call my church began to transform into something

which today is unrecognisable, means that I can no longer call it

my home.

This is not the result of any one thing although it is fair to say that the behaviour of the leadership which for me has displayed dishonesty, a lack of integrity and bullying

has been the proverbial final straw.

So on the topic of City Church, this will be my final entry.

I am going to Belgium this week to visit Ypres and the sites of some of the significant sites of first world war battles.

I am really looking forward to it but will be off line all week.

I am going to journal while out there so will pass on

my thoughts when I return.

By their fruits they shall be known

I sit here and the computer screen is blank

yet

my brain is full.

My brain is full of the events of this week

and their implications,

but

trying to translate this fullness into coherent

thoughts means that after forty nine words

I am once more staring at blank space.

This week I have born witness to:

confusion

anger

deceit

sadness

pain

injustice

struggle

People I love have been profoundly hurt.

People who I had chosen to trust in a

leadership role have abused that trust.

And all in a church community.

I am at a loss to explain what has happened

but

what I do know is that there is something intrinsically wrong

within many church cultures and in particular

those coming out of a Protestant evangelical charismatic

background.

Many, like that I have been part of, are new,

at least in the context of

church history.

On the positive side this means that they don't have the baggage of

tradition,

On the negative there doesn't seem to be an ability to reflect

and learn from the mistakes of others.

In the last week I have seen twenty people,

using only themselves as a frame of reference

engage in a process

that they are convinced is

the right thing.

So convinced of their position

they did not seek wisdom from those who are older or others within the wider

church community.

The result is that they have to persuade those in the body of the church

that they are justified in their actions

at all cost.

And in this process

two good people who I care for deeply,

have been scapegoated.

There are no conclusions to this situation

at this time.

There is no formula that can be applied that will make it all clear.

There are no platitudes that will make it ok.

There is just living it.