Thursday 3 June 2010

Wacky palm fronds and powerful worship


Now some people might fear that this photo is part of my feminist plot to prove that the meeting here is overfilled with balding men but a) the Edinburgh 2010 meeting in more diverse than this picture shows b) your attention is supposed to be drawn to the totally wacky palm trees in the background - I'm hoping there will be some rather better photos of them on the Edinburgh 2010 site. I am not sure why but I really love these wacky cloth palm trees which looked blown by the wind. Standing up amongst them is the wonderful and equally colourful John Bell of the Iona community. This picture is from last night's welcoming songs and words, which was like the palm fronds a wonderfully joyful, colourful and tuneful time.
Scattered around the Pollock Halls conference venue the palm trees decorate special entrances and halls. But in colourful and yet discreet ways there are also coloured cloth leaves scattered in the gardens, often with the word peace, paz, pace embroidered on them.
Anyway I am already trying to work out if they will auction the palms off at the end of the meeting and whether I could carry one back on the eurostar. Wonder if I can convince a colleague to take the interpretation equipment for me so I can carry a wacky cloth palm home. More photos of them soon - they are lovely but somehow impossible to photo.


4 Comments:

shallowfrozenwater said...

John Bell will be visiting my community here in Winnipeg Canada later this month. we love that guy around these parts.

Jane said...

Firs time I've actually met him but I have been using his liturgies for ages. Am very impressed with what he's managed to get us to do musically here. And I love his dress sense if that's the word ...

cloudy_lemonade said...

Hi jane, it was lovely to meet you in edinburgh. I also fell in love with the fabric palms :)

Holly

carol said...

Hi,
so glad you liked the palms, and you too Holly. ... thanks.
Jane , was sorry not to have a longer conversation with you. ... where did all the time go !
I have been making various incarnations of the palms for the last 10 yrs each Palm Sunday with the children for my home church St.James Episcopal Church Leith.
[www.stjamesleith.org] and for various conferences and others events around Britain - these were the first fabric ones - ' international trees' - all the others have been paper ! There are more photos on
www.soulmarks.co.uk

Thanks again for your enthusiasm and delight !
Carol