Popologetics

Brain hurting today. Spent most of the day reading Ted Turneau's  book titled above.

Clearly written from an evangelical standpoint it throws out an important challenge to Christians who need to engage in all aspects of popular culture, which he defines as cultural activities away from 'spiritual spaces inhabited by the elite' Popular culture is found where the people are and includes TV  film, music social media etc.....

We shouldn't try to avoid or be frightened of such engagement  as 'popular culture can bestow on us a vision of reality that can influence the way we think about God'

He stresses the need to understand the 'world view'  that provides the foundation: presuppositions,  world story,  life philosophy  applied beliefs and practises which set the context for any work of popular culture.

There are notes of caution for Christians who thus engage: they must 'consider their motivation in engaging with popular culture. It is a gift of God,  and we may enjoy it wisely. Further we go to Popular culture for insight because our world is saturated by it and we want to love those who find their ultimate meaning there. But we ought not to rely on it... '

Turneau sets out five steps to aid Christians as they encounter popular culture- analysing the story,  looking for the world it inhabits and how one inhabits it,  looking for the good and bad and finally discovering Gospel links.

I suppose this is the bit I'm struggling with,  he sees all culture as a gift of God which is of course the Christian world view   he also draws parallels between participation in popular culture  and worship, his final summary refers to it as a 'mission field' I'm wondering if that's a bit cynical.  Interesting to consider how Turneau relates to Neihbur's typology. Is his starting point more about 'Christ Transforming Culture'  rather than 'Christ of Culture' which presents a more symbiotic approach?

Yes I shall seek to be discerning in listening to popular music,  Yes I shall listen to the words and approach the experience from a Christ centred perspective. Yes, I shall look for Gospel resonances but I will also want to meet people where they are  accepting their words and practises as authentic expressions of who they are. I note the warning that 'popular culture cannot be viewed as the pure voice of God' and will indeed seek the gift of discernment but also the gift of openness.

I obviously need to do some more thinking!

Having said that it's been a good day.  One last quote:'popular culture is a big, messy mixture of sin and grace,  light and dark that plays in deep and subtle ways with the desires of the human heart through imagination'

Off for a walk tomorrow  no words, just  pictures.  I hope the Derbyshire views will help ease my hurting  brain!

Lolipops, flip flops and being there, a night with street pastors

I'll let the pictures speak for themselves. I was overwhelmed at the dedication and commitment of the team and the way they interacted with revellers, door staff, street people and enforcement officers alike. Above all the non-judgemental and gracious accepting love shown to everyone who was encountered.
Most heard phrases included:

'You are our guardian angels'
' Is this really a free gift?'
'I can't believe you give up your Saturday evenings for us!'

All that for the gift of a friendly word, a lollipop (loved by the door staff), bottle of water or a pair of flip flops.

Reminded me of a story about a son who took his inheritance and squandered it in a far off country, but when he returned he was received unconditionally, with absolute love. Where did I first heart that?

Take me to church!

Saturday 4th July: Take me to church?
Continuing my Glastonbury carpet picnic by watching BBC2’s festival highlights programme.
Again struck at the way that the crowd knew and sang along with the songs performed by in (in my eyes!) even the most obscure bands. One song that always brings rapturous joining-in is by Hozier (who we can no longer call obscure) an award winning Irish singer-songwriter.
His ‘Take me to church’ has won plaudits and enormous popularity and is a great song.
A very selective reading of the lyrics suggest that the tens of thousands joining in with Hozier are in fact worshipping God ‘Offer me my deathless death, Good God, let me give you my life’ but this is fallacious

The song compares the liberation found in sexual union with the experience of repression which the writer presumably found within his native Catholic Church. In a magazine article he comments: ‘An act of sex is one of the most human things. But an organisation, like the church, say, through its doctrine would undermine humanity by successfully teaching shame about sexual orientation – that it is sinful, that it offends God’
http://www.songfacts.com/detail.php?id=32921

Whilst going out of his way to assert that he is not attacking faith per se, he is drawing out conclusions about the teaching of the church which are at the heart of so much opposition to organised religion today. The song is offered as an antidote: ‘it is about asserting yourself and reclaiming your humanity through an act of love.’

Hang on, doesn’t this sum up the Gospel?

Another line states ‘I was born sick but I love it/command me to be well’ like many who seek to explore secular spirituality, Hozier suggests that such spirituality is concerned with improving life in  the here and now whereas religious spiritualty is focussed on what happens after death. Overly simplistic, yes - but isn’t it true that the men (yes they were/are men) who sought and seek to use religion to control the masses chose to use this argument for their own ends? Wasn’t Jesus concerned about healing (command me to be well), making whole and bringing abundant life? Didn’t he say more about the abuse of money, secular and religious power than he did about sex? Wasn’t he fully human and completely God? How can we get this message to the multitudes that only see repression and control where we see love and freedom?

I suspect this is a theme I shall return to again and again!

Street pastors

Tonight I'm going out with Street Pastors. What amazing work they do
http://streetpastors.org/locations/sheffield/about-us/

Sun, St Paul, Clean Bandit and Madness - Day one!

I promise not to write something every day. Who wants to know what I had for breakfast, lunch or tea? I'll only blog when something interesting happens that's worth the odd reflection or two. However, having said that, day one is probably worth a blog.  All that space ahead of me. How will I fill it?  When will I l finally cast the diary aside?

Sun, St Paul, Clean Bandit and Madness. A good place to start!

The long anticipated heatwave also begins but will it continue for 13 weeks I wonder?

Today I revisited the Biblical story which sort of underpins my theme. Paul found himself in Athens confronted by spiritual but not religious people. He treated them with respect and drew parallels between the unknown God they idolised and the real God he knew in Jesus Christ (Acts 17). Some hearers scoffed, some walked away but some believed. May I follow that example of patient engagement with the Spirituality of others.

Clean Bandit is my favourite techno dance classical fusion band at the moment (!) Watching them at my Glastonbury carpet picnic, it struck me that they are a perfect symbol of our multi-cultural, multi-dimensional spiritual but not religious society.  E.g. from the title song on their current album, 'new eyes':  these opening lines have been compared to a prayer of Adoration and supplication: (http://www.metrolyrics.com/new-eyes-lyrics-clean-bandit.htmlhttp://www.metrolyrics.com/new-eyes-lyrics-clean-bandit.html)

‘In the quiet of my room

I gather up my thoughts and questions

Could I ever be like you?

Could I ever be a person, so real and so true?

It seems implausible

I look at my reflection

If only I could say

The things I never mention

The things you never knew

And I'd like to thank you for the human I've become

I'm sorry if I've let you down

I'm trying, I'm learning as I stumble along

To see this new world through new eyes'.

Or later in the same song:

Once upon a time there was a girl who loved the world so much she gave her only begotten sunshine and dried her stained eyes....' (Discuss!!)

As for Madness - apart from the obvious- I'm taking a morning off sabbatical next Monday to conduct a funeral. The person we'll be remembering wouldn't have described himself as religious but was deeply into music of all kinds. His family was spoiled for choice in selecting three numbers to play at the service. One they finally settled on is an unusually mellow song from the normally nutty Madness, 'Forever Young' - 'so stay forever young; don't do what I have done, before paradise lost and innocence gone. '

 So my message will draw out some of God's eternal truths about repentance, hope and eternal life from the words of Suggs. How Apt!

Minus one: being out of touch

I can't  believe it! My  countdown app was set for 144 days but now it's down to one!

Today I've been in Bradford at an immigration Tribunal,  caught up briefly with my good friend Adrian and had various concerns about pastoral ministry and circuit matters but from tomorrow that's all on hold, thanks to the wonderful support of colleagues.

In a minute the phones will be switched off,  Penny is going to change the password on my 'Methodist email account' so it will be impossible to keep in touch.  I will be genuinely off radar for three months and a bit.  Wow!

But praise be, God won't be out of touch with his servant.  In the words  of a wise Bishop 'I'm going on a journey,  it would be great to have your company Lord so I can learn from you,  but if you aren't able to join me,  I'll enjoy the journey anyway'

Tomorrow I'll post some day one reflections here and on Facebook but I'm making a promise that I'll only do that when I have something to say!

Minus four... The Bright Field

This beautiful poem sets  the theme for Greenbelt and also much of my forthcoming sabbatical:

The Bright Field

I have seen the sun break through
to illuminate a small field
for a while, and gone my way
and forgotten it. But that was the
pearl of great price, the one field that had
treasure in it. I realise now
that I must give all that I have
to possess it. Life is not hurrying

on to a receding future, nor hankering after
an imagined past. It is the turning
aside like Moses to the miracle
of the lit bush, to a brightness
that seemed as transitory as your youth
once, but is the eternity that awaits you.

RS Thomas

One of the gifts that I have been preparing to receive in the coming weeks is that of time:

Life is not hurrying

on to a receding future, nor hankering after
an imagined past. I