I've had a great day. The best day I can remember for a long while. I spent it in a largish greyish room with a large data projector that took a worrying half hour to show any pictures and twenty or so young people sitting around on chairs and lying on the floor. Oh yes, and a half dozen or so clergy and adult lay leaders. I talked to them about God, and somehow the thoughts and intuitions I had gathered up over the previous 24 hours shaped themselves into a coherent conversation about the Father, The Son and The Holy Spirit which ran all morning and into the early afternoon. These were an astonishing bunch of young people, and they had been well led as a group by Lynda Paterson and Peter Beck from Christchurch Cathedral, as well as the chaplains of Christ's and St. Margaret's colleges. As a group, they listened. They asked intelligent and perceptive questions. They made searching, and at times frank comments. They talked to each other with respect, enthusiasm and focus. They cracked jokes and clowned around. Three of them were the offspring of colleagues I have known and respected for years, and it was a bit uncanny how they resembled their parents in every possible way. One of them talked to me over lunch about how he listens to records instead of CDs and he likes to go to a second hand shop in Christchurch and buy English progressive rock from the 1970s - the very stuff I listened to when I was his age. Several asked about call and vocation. At the end of the day they made a speech thanking me for being there, but it was me who was grateful, and it was me that gained most from the day. It's been a while since I have led that sort of workshop and I had almost forgotten how much I enjoy it. Mostly though, being in the company of young people who are faithful and intelligent about what they believe is a very invigorating and reassuring experience. Who knows what shape the church will be in in 30 years time, but I got a small glimpse of it this afternoon and the news is all good.
Living as I do in a place where most books have to come a long way in an aeroplane, reading is an expensive addiction, and of course there is always the problem of shelf space. I have about 50 metres of shelving in my new study, but it is already full and there is not a lot of wall space left; and although it is great insulation, what is eventually going to happen to all that paper? I doubt my kids will want to fill their homes with old theological works, so most of my library is eventually going to end up as egg cartons. Ebooks are one solution to book cost and storage issues so I have been using them for a while now, but their big problem has been finding suitable hardware to read them on. I first read them on the tiny screens of Ipaqs and they were quite satisfactory but the wretchedness of Microsoft Reader and its somewhat arbitrary copyright protection system killed the experience entirely. On Palm devices they were OK except the plethora of competing and incompatible formats
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Mix fun, thoughtful, intelligent, and caring youth who look deeper at the world around them with hope and with insight and respect, along with a healthy Christian outlook, and you get a very bright tomorrow.
Sounds like the day was a simply awesome!
J.
I just got back from my weekly work at my son's primary school, where I volunteer as a reading tutor.
The kids I work with are those who have been identified with reading difficulties. I love getting to know the kids as individuals, and learning how to spark their interest in, and love for, reading.
Sometimes it is simply a matter of finding the right book. Or it can be reading aloud and laughing over ridiculously outdated illustrations.
Whatever we teach, the key to success is connecting with those we're teaching, and remembering that we have as much to learn as we have to offer :-)
Thank you again,
Bosco
(Chaplain, Christ's College)
I know that you loved Iona. Would you very kindly remember me and a group of pilgrims from Bramhall, UK, as we make retreat there from 6-12 May ?
http://simonmarsh.org/2010/05/04/iona/
Thanks, peace and continuing joy to you.
Simon
Peter
PS Surely not as good-looking ...:)