Listen, Build, Engage, Share … an article written for a Danish web portal

Sometimes we only write because other people ask us to write. So thanks to Christian Cohr Arffmann for asking me to write. Now my jottings have been translated into Danish. Perhaps I will get around to writing the four other particles I thought about as I was writing this. It's not very edgy, but perhaps that's what you get when you ask a church bureaucrat to write. Oh dear is that really what I am? aie!
Anyway here it is ... and you can read the Danish here.

The future of the church is not behind us. That may sound obvious, but often in western Europe our vision for how the church should be is modelled on how things were in the past. Yet globally today’s church is youthful, it’s growing and it's engaged with people in their daily struggles for life, existence and meaning. Millions of people in today’s world continue to be inspired and transformed by the words and story of Jesus of Nazareth. It’s difficult to know how many Bibles are being printed in China today; nearly impossible to count how many meals Christians serve to the world's hungry each day. That should be reason to hope and give real energy for the future. We need to listen to stories of hope and change and allow ourselves to be fed by them.
In rural Tanzania a young Anglican community worker, employed by a Lutheran agency, encourages people in civil society to take action to safeguard their right to water. Working with local mosques and churches is an important part of that advocacy and education. To make a change in people's daily lives in a meaningful way, building bridges across denominations, across religions and engaging with civil society is essential.
Across the world working for transformation, development or education means tapping into the extraordinary network of professionalism, creativity and community that is the church. Not many other organisations have the inbuilt capacity for national and international advocacy while maintaining strong local involvement.
Sometimes in western Europe the picture looks different. Of course some parts of the church will not continue in their present form. There are institutions that will not survive, buildings that will be closed. There is pain and grief when things die. There are also real worries: will there be churches committed and able to take the agenda of social justice and peace into the future? It can be a frustrating and very challenging time for institutions, desperate to hold on to and assert their identity.
Nevertheless, I believe that what is emerging is a complex picture of new ways of belonging to church and practising faith. People will shop around for a community which "fits" their needs at a particular time in their faith journey. At the same time there is enormous gospel creativity, new forms of church - not so based on denominations - are emerging. People want to bear witness to the gospel that inspires them, be involved in practical service with the suffering and dispossessed, using church buildings in new ways, discovering both a new monasticism and a new ecumenism - look at the exciting development in the harbour of Hamburg, where 18 churches decided that instead of building their own places of worship, they would pool their resources in one ecumenical centre. Others like the Moot project in Britain live out their faith in small groups in the heart of vulnerable communities - daring to live alongside and share with those whom society would rather forget about or scapegoat.
So are we dreaming the right dream for the future? Do we want something big and powerful when the future of the church - at least here in western Europe - may lie in something smaller but much more transformational. Worldwide most Christian churches exist in the context of being minorities. This needs to inform how we dream and hope. We need to let those biblical kingdom visions of yeast, seeds and hidden treasure inform our theology of hope more clearly.
One thing I believe I discern in the current situation of the church globally is that many Christians are learning that there are people working for peace, justice, health and service from all parts of the church.
The World Council of Churches recently held an International Ecumenical Peace Convocation in Jamaica. At the gathering in Kingston extraordinary stories were told, a common spirit for peace with justice was discovered and celebrated as we read the Ecumenical Call to Just Peace. The stories of the encounters and experiences of Christians and churches working for social justice and to overcome violence will go on being told.
The Quaker theologian Grace Jantzen repeatedly points to how Christian theology needs to focus more on that which is "natal" rather than that which is "mortal". Human beings are made for life. Are our churches able to do that?
We need to be challenged by social media and networking in the way we build the future. We need to find ways for our stories of life, hope and inspiration to go "viral". But we can be encouraged by social media, which focus on four key words: Listen, Build, Engage, Share. That’s not a bad starting point in charting a path for the future of the church.

The Ecumenical Call to Just Peace: http://www.overcomingviolence.org/fileadmin/dov/files/iepc/resources/ECJustPeace_English.pdf

If you bomb a place, think about how you clear up the armaments afterwards - Photos from Libya

There was a report today on the radio about how some of the construction work in Germany is being held up because of old bombs and munitions from the second world war. Part of the pornographic lie of war is that it is a quick, "surgical" solution - bomb them, get in, get out, mission over. It's such a lie. Not far from where we used to live in Dunkerque are the battlefields of the First World War. Still today farmers turn up spent and unspent cartridges and munitions as they plough the fields. The harvest of war can continue for many generations.
The picture here is from Misrata, Libya, taken just a couple of days ago by Paul Jeffrey for the ACTalliance. ACT have put together a powerful and moving photo gallery of the photos from Libya. Sandra Cox writes:
Macabre museums of unexploded shells, warheads and mines have ready sprung up around the city, and a deadly new hobby of arms tourism is in vogue. Children are using the battle zones as life-size playgrounds, where they risk losing limbs or their lives ...
The next job of ACT’s de-mining team is clearing Misrata's so-called museums of mass-destruction – ad hoc collections of live and dead munitions that have appeared in homes and businesses throughout the city in the last couple of weeks.
I've spent lots of time thinking about, reflecting on, writing about and celebrating "justpeace" in recent weeks and months. Pictures like these really bring the destruction of war home. How many millions went into buying these weapons? Is a similar amount being put into demining and reconstruction? More and more I understand Paul Oestreicher's call for an abolition of war.
In the meantime I wish my colleagues at ACT and all working with them the utmost safety as they carry out this risky and painstaking task, no surgical quick fix talk at this end of the story. The aftermath of war takes many lifetimes to clear up. We forget so easily.

You can also view the photos in the Independent.

Fragments of a translated Pentecost sermon and the mother tongue of resurrection values

This morning in Ferney three young people finished their catechism, two asked for confirmation, one has decided to wait for a while before asking for baptism in a few years time. Each of them chose Bible passages and confessed their faith. It was a good service and the sun shone for drinks in the garden afterwards. Over 14 years ago I baptised the two young women who confirmed, both come from mixed confessional and national backgrounds. Together with Bernard Millet the pastor, we led the service and presided at communion. I preached, as this is probably my last year helping with KT. The sermon was in French of course, what follows is a rather imperfect version in English. Dr B's comment was - you have become very French using your hands alot! He was also gracious enough to say that he thought it was a good sermon. Perhaps I was using my hands more because today I preached from notes rather than from a text, so I was rather freer. Strange, although I've advised at least two people to do this themselves in recent months, I don't always feel at home with it myself - but perhaps I feel more at home with it in French than in English.

Texts
Joel2:28-29 (interestingly this is chapter 3 in the French Bibles!)
²⁸ Then afterwards
I will pour out my spirit on all flesh;
your sons and your daughters shall prophesy,
your old men shall dream dreams,
and your young men shall see visions.
²⁹ Even on the male and female slaves,
in those days, I will pour out my spirit.

Galations 5:22-26
22 By contrast, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, ²³gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against such things. ²⁴And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. ²⁵If we live by the Spirit, let us also be guided by the Spirit. ²⁶Let us not become conceited, competing against one another, envying one another.

Today its my feast day - and I know you all thought it was your party - Pentecost after all is the feast of translators and interpreters! Or perhaps it's actually the day the Holy Spirit makes all of us translators unemployed, after all that first Pentecost sermon was heard by everyone in their own language without any need for booths and headphones. So perhaps I should preach this morning en anglais, oder auf deutsch or maybe in a language like Arabic or Spanish that I don't speak at all and trust that everyone including me would be able to understand.
But I suspect we'd all be saying, along with our opening reading "what is the meaning of all this?"

Hmm what is the meaning of all this? What is Pentecost? It's a moving and turbulent story of hearts being touched with energy and understanding in the same way that those present were also touched by flames of fire. Pentecost is the grand finale of Easter and marks the end of the 50 days of Easter, the Spirit comes to breathe and embed the values of the resurrection into the lives of the first disciples, to breathe renewal and warmth and also to comfort and remind them of the true values of the resurrection.

One way of putting it is that the Spirit teaches them - and us - the mother tongue of gospel resurrection values. We read about those values in Paul's letter to the Galations : the gifts of the Spirit are love, peace, faithfulness, goodness, self control ...
When Christ rises from the dead he brings those values of the resurrection back with him from the grave - he doesn't come back saying to those who have tortured and crucified him "I'm going to get you". He doesn't seek to find those who did him such evil and nail them to a cross, nor does he ask his friends to do that for him. He comes across locked doors and says"peace be with you" he also says "receive the Holy Spirit".
These are the resurrection values the Spirit breathes into our lives, hoping that they will take root in us and guide our witness to the Risen One.
Two weeks ago I had just come back from Jamaica, despite rumours to the contrary I wasn't there on holiday, my employer the World Council of Churches organised an international meeting about peace, there were over a 1000 people from more than 100 countries for the meeting which had teh rather long name of International Ecumenical Peace Convocation - and you can imagine we certainly needed the interpretation booths there! People came together to discuss "just peace" - that might seem a strange sort of idea but even this week I've heard the idea of "just violence" being used by Hilary Clinton, saying violence against a "guilty" member of Al Quaida was justified. So much in our world justifies violence, makes it acceptable to us, yet Jesus' resurrection values are different - peace be with you he says.

If there was just one story to bring back from the Peace convocation it would be the story of the ordinary women in Liberia which we learned about through a film. These women helped through their concerted and long term prayer and action for peace to completely transform their country in Africa which had been suffering from a desperate and totally devastating civil war and dictatorship - men and boys caught up in war, forced to fight, women and children brutalised and raped. Their song was "We want peace now. Liberia is our home", their only arms white tshirts, creativity and tenacity. Praying across the Christian confessions, taking the prayer for peace to the Mosques and out onto the streets. Demonstrating next to the road where they knew the dictator would pass by, and not giving up.
The resurrection values of peace are not gained quickly or easily, but in place of a culture of totally acceptable violence these women, sang out and prayed out and went onto the streets for different values. We want peace now. Things are far from perfect in Liberia today, it remains a desperately poor country, but the absence of war has completely transformed the lives of all and left space for democracy and a different future. The women in Liberia dreamt and they acted upon their dream, the values of peace can become our mother tongue even in a war torn country.

The prophet Joel promises that young and old together will have dreams and visions, the servants and not just the ruling class. The Spirit is promised and shared out upon all. The resurrection values of peace, joy, faithfulness and love are not just for one generation but to be shared down the ages and across the ages. The Spirit of Pentecost pours into our hearts the mother tongue of understanding those values of Jesus Christ of Nazareth. It tries to put those other words on our lips, encourage our hands to other actions.
After Pentecost the church year moves into what it calls "ordinary" time - the Sundays often just have the word Pentecost and then a number after them. Today we can celebrate with the three of you who end your catechism this year, who confess your faith and ask for confirmation. You too will move into "ordinary" time - even though we will not see you at KT any longer we certainly hope to go on seeing you at church.
Somehow although it's not always easy to get out of bed on a Saturday morning we have managed to learn from one another and transmit some of these values of the resurrection to one another. It's not always easy across the generations to feel we speak the same language yet somehow across time Jesus' Holy Spirit has been whispering resurrection values in our hearts, teaching us to speak the language of peace and faithfulness, of joy and self control, of compassion and generosity.
On this last day of Easter let us celebrate our commitment to being transformed by the Spirit-given mother tongue of the values of the resurrection, and let's do that by saying together Christ is risen! Christ is risen indeed! but in another language, in Greek - as this is a tradtion which has come to us ecumenically from the Orthodox churches:
Christos Anesti
Alithos Anesti
Christos Anesti
Alithos Anesti
Christos Anesti
Alithos Anesti
May we all learn to speak the Gospel mother tongue of resurrection values - peace joy faithfulness compassion self control
Amen

Hands together to drop small arms and for a strong international treaty

Today is the first full day of the Kirchentag and we're working hard at the WCC and Bossey stand in the marketplace. This is almost a live blogpost from the stand. We've already had lots of fascinating conversations with people from all over Germany but also from around the world - visitors in the first two hours from Congo and Ethiopia, the Netherlands, Finland, Denmark and Britain - and those are just the ones I spoke with.
The activity that's working really well is collecting signatures in favour of a strong treaty for small weapons reduction. People are taking photos of the different ways they draw around their hands and sign the cloth petition, some of the hand outlines have been really well decorated. It's really good to have brought this to the Kirchentag from the International Ecumenical Peace convocation.
The Norwegian Churches have started the initiative, now we have to hope that some folk here at the Kirchentag will take the initiative up here in Germany and in the other countries people are from. Let's get things going from below so that pressure is put on those at the negotiating table in 2012 to make a strong treaty and reduce small arms use throughout the world.
Meanwhile I shall be faced with a technical challenge this evening, how to get thephotos off my new mobile phone and onto the facebook page. hmm...
and this is my first blog post with my new netbook and I can't find where teh phots are stored here either. Ah well by the end of the Kirchentag perhaps I'll have it all sorted out!

Word of the day - métier à tisser - the loom of peace could also be the ministry of peace

It's difficult with a rather flaky mobile internet connection on my way through Eastern Germany to do the etymological research I need for some passing thoughts about the word "métier à tisser" which is French for a loom. In German it's a Webstuhl - literally a weaving chair. Given how at the Peace Convocation we have thought a great deal about weaving, weaving stories, weaving history, weaving the future ... it is not surprising that I should begin to think about the French word for loom. The French word métier is used today to mean profession. But looking at these etymological defintions I was surprised to see that the word has its origins in the sense of service or ministry. I suppose for the loom this means that that the métier ministers to the tissage, it "serves" the weaving, making it possible for cloth and textile to be woven.
So this set me thinking about how we have been talking about the Convocation, perhaps one of its roles was to be of service to the weaving together of just peace from many diverse contexts. It was a loom, being that loom was part of the WCC's ministry of peace with justice.

Resurrection chaos with the peaceful Ichthys

I realise that I have said very little about the worship at the IEPC and wanted to try and correct that at least a bit. It was deeply satisfying, deceptively simple and uplifting in a sort of slow burn way. I really like worship like this, meaningful yet very joyful. Messages both implicit and explicit.
I shared an appartment at the halls of residence with the female members of the worship committee and I know how hard they worked, putting together at least three services every day, often re-writing at the last minute and dealing with lots of last minute hiccoughs. We had very early morning starts for the musical and practical rehearsals. They were putting in 12-14 hour days in very difficult circumstances.
At the final sending service they had really wanted us to gather at the beach but for all kinds of practical reasons this wasn't possible, too far, too late in the day. Yet in many ways we were at the beach.
Each of us received a large paper fish. As part of the reflection we were invited to write on the fish. This followed on from a wonderful multilingual reading of John 21, the miraculous fish catch and Christ's resurrection breakfast with his friends on the beach. The fish were then gathered into a wodnerful net which was hauled forward to the altar. In the choir we had to keep on singing and singing as people kept on wanting to write more and more, or make sure that their fish had an eye on it, of proper scales or a smiley face.
Then instead of sharing the peace in a traditional way we drew the shape of the fish, the ichthys, on the palm of our neighbours' hands. It tickled a bit and made us smile but it was a great idea and just really worked well.
I was moved by the idea of the fish being the love banquet, the true eucharist and reason to give thanks. So closing prayers did take us symbolically to the beach, to that liminal place of resurrection where the fishy fruit of the chaotic ocean meets the bread of the civilised land. It made me think about embracing the chaos being part of the resurrection message, only if we dare to do that will the miraculous catch of just peace be possible.

And of course we've also been singing all through the convocation, mostly things not know to me beforehand, including this ... not quite about the beach but still about bread and fish.

“On the green, green grass they gathered long ago.
To hear what the Master said.
What they had they shared some fishes and some loaves.
And they served until all were fed.
Until all are fed we cry out.
Until all on earth have bread.
Like the One who loves us each & every one...
We serve until all are fed."

Tears - we shall not hang our harps on the willows

The opening worship for the IEPC included a prayer of lament, during the words of the prayer we hummed the tune to from the rivers of Babylon and then in the silence in between one of the young people from Jamaica bent down to a bowl of water and rose, wringing out tears of injustice and suffering. It was moving and powerful. As we moved from the lament further into the liturgy, our humming became singing - "By the rivers of babylon, where we sat down, and we wept when we remembered ..."
As we reflect on and work for just peace there is enormous pain but there is also hope. We will not hang our harps on the willows, we will continue to hum and sing the song, both of pain and of hope.