I'll never be the same [again]

So, got back from New Wine North and East late last night. Still got lots to process (which I will eventually get around to blogging about) but we had a great week, so here are my top  (mostly humorous) reasons why Newark is better than Shepton Mallett (and maybe a couple why it isn't)

1: Its SO much easier to get to from virtually anywhere east of Reading. 1 hour 50 mins beats the 9 hours it took one of my friends to get to Shepton Mallett from Essex a few years back. No more M25 or A303 for me on the last day in July ...

2: The campsite is flat with short grass; no more marital disharmony levelling the van or putting up the awning!

3: It is smaller, only 6 and a half thousand people, so more personal and a lot less queueing.

4: Let's face it, there was less Boden and Joules and more scousers and tattoos and therefore it was more like real life (sorry LSE folk).

5: [Getting theological now, steady on] There was  more overt affirmation of women in ordained ministry from the stage. This week for me there was another watershed moment when the evening introductions in the Meeting Place (that's venue 1 in old money)were done by a clergy spouse, who was a man!!

6: There was a concerted effort to explain what was going on for the uninitiated; lots of "you may not have done this before..." This is in the spirit of 1Corinthians 14 for me.

7: AWACS and Red Arrows flypasts!

and 2 why not ...
1: It's just one week, so no cashpoint, no recycling, and a minimal shop. Takeaway food quite limited too. If we had another week, or a Soul Survivor, I appreciate these things would be easier to arrange.

2: Currys .... [you had to be there]

Derivatar

So, my wife is now the only person in Britain over the age of 12 and under the age of 50 who hasn't seen Avatar because I watched it last night. We got it off Love Film and I did love it.

I enjoyed it so much that I didn't even notice it was midnight when the credits rolled. Let me say that again, I really enjoyed the film, and as I said then, "I believe the hype".

That said, I did spend quite a lot of the time saying "that's like in so and so". Thankfully there was only one " 'ere, wasn't she in Lost?" However I have concluded that this was possibly the most derivative film I've ever seen, in terms of plot, characterisation and indeed props and scenery. So here's my Avatar hall of fame (or should that be shame?)

PLOT
Well, obviously it owes a lot to the Matrix, in terms of the "special one", in terms of going in and and coming out of another world, and so on. When Grace and Jake were awoken and their avatars collapsed I couldn't help thinking of that scene I usually fast forward in the Matrix when Cypher pulls the plug ... The ending (btw as you gather from my opening statement, I'm assuming you've all seen it and won't mind that this is littered with spoilers) was also very similar to the end of the Matrix with the awakening in the other world.

The way Jake changed sides by association with the Na'vi (btw = Hebrew for  prophet) was to me lifted straight from Dances with Wolves (Costner's finest moment anyone?) even down to the journal style monologue voiceover.

The basic resistance movement plotline appeared to be derivative of the Magnificent 7/7 Samurai/Bug's Life storyline, or many other little vs big movies I'm sure you can identify. More from Bugs Life in a minute. One might even derive elements of the "fetch the clans" bit from the Lord of the Rings final battle scene.

Naturally the evil general was the usual stereotype, and of course I did enjoy that nerdy guy from Friends/Saving Private Ryan as the sort of evil middle management. Otherwise it was great that most of the characters were smurfs ... sorry Na'vi so you couldn't get distracted by trying to remember what else they'd been in.

PROPS & SCENERY
To me Home Tree did in fact look exactly like Ant Island from Bugs life, but in HD. And while we're with Pixar do you really expect me to take seriously a giant blue character called Sully after I've seen Monsters Inc (a little research never does any harm!)

The armoured suits (like the one the general wore in the final showdown) were clearly actually borrowed from the Matrix props cupboard and just jazzed up a bit for low oxygen use.

The twin prop helicopters reminded me of the twin prop helicopters on Syndrome's island in the Incredibles, and the big gunship reminded me of the Millennium Falcon, except if it had been eating doughnuts since filming stopped on Star Wars.

And the whole Pandora background was like watching a Roger Dean poster come to life (and I know I'm not the only person to have noticed this).

So why did this happen? We're told James Cameron had the idea for this film ages ago when the technology to create it didn't exist. In many senses it was like watching (yet) another animated film like the ones my kids are just growing out of.

My take on it is this; Cameron had the idea for the movie and then he had a dream in which a mash-up of all the films I've mentioned came to him, and then he knew he was ready... He's obviously been watching a lot of Disney films and cartoons on TV (if there was any justice in the movie world, "The Last Airbender" would be called "Avatar") and I like to think he fell asleep looking at the cover from "Tales from Topographic oceans" or some such thing.

I think it was George Harrison who said that eventually all the songs possible would be written because of a finite number of combinations of notes. It seems to me with Avatar we have reached the point where art isn't imitating life, just other art.
But I still thought it was great and will watch it again tomorrow with my "looking out for spiritual reference points" hat on.

A Facebook Passion

I almost broke my fast to post this directly on Facebook - just hoping enough people bother to read this when it posts there automatically.

check this out for a different take on Easter

h/t dmk

Out of the Blue and into the Black

Avatar: the backlash ...



h/t The grumpy Cleric

and I think I better think it out again

I'm getting ready for meetings with my first couple of consultees as a Ministry Development Review consultant. In tandem with that, recent events here and elsewhere have also got me thinking again about my leadership style.
Not sure I could pull off this approach, but loved it anyway (h/t anneDroid a prison chaplain)

NB those reading this on facebook, I posted it through blogger and so have not broken my fast!

In the name of the [grand] Father ...

I saw this and thought of Phil, who often reflects (though not always theologically) on Manchester Utd.

h/t Off the post, and a h/t to Phil for drawing my attention to them, although this act in itself is having a serioulsy detrimental effect on my work rate in the parish (only joking Archdeacon).

I'm happy hope you're happy too

Someone texted the BBC:

"Ricky Ponting, Shane Warne, Donald Bradman, Crocodile Dundee, Merv Hughes, Skippy the bush kangaroo, Kevin Rudd, Jason Donovan, Rolf Harris, Kylie Minogue, your boys took a hell of a beating!"

If you remember Norway beating England (at football) all those years ago then that text is funny. If not, well, just enjoy the moment.

The Snoopy quotation I was after online the other day was

"It's not whether you win or lose, but how cool you are"

Of course, that bit of googling was going on on Friday afternoon when Broad was devastating the Australian middle order, so (being an eternal pessemist when it comes to English sporting achievement) at the time I hadn't seen the score and so I was expecting us to lose, but in a cool way.

For me the highlight of the Ashes is still Strauss' good sportsmanship in allowing the Aussies to substitute their injured 'keeper after the team sheets had been declared, when he could have made them play with 10 men early on in the series. That was cool.

that's me in the corner [if cricket was a religion!]

I was looking online for a quotation from Snoopy that I once got in a birthday card a long time ago from an ex-girlfriend, which is going to be the basis of my post - Ashes post next week, and I found this. Enjoy

I can't be that much of a loser as I have at least managed to get the embedding code to work (kind of)!

Glastonbury special SAB

Have you ever seen Jimmy Greaves and David Crosby in the same room at the same time? Could it be that Greavsie's form dipped in the late 60's because he was using up so much energy touring with CSN&Y?

And he's watchin' us all

I had an idea tonight; you know how Terminators (in the film and TV franchise) have this thing that happens in their eye whereby they can look at someone and get from a computer programme information like name, date of birth, address, state of health etc.

I could really do with getting one of those fitted, for those moments in pastoral minsitry when you are talking to someone you have met before, who obviously knows who you are, but you have no recollection of who they are or where you met them.

It would really be a great bolt on, as my own RAM drive is getting rather full these days!

with a poster of rasputin and a beard down to his knee

This is good stuff, but I was very distracted by the thought "Clement Freud lives"!

Pie Jesu

This is me and my missus (making her FMH debut) getting pied last Sunday at the Under The Sea Celebration. It was (other than the pie-ing) a brilliant event; nearly150 people, many of whom had never been in the church. A gentle gospel challenge was given, and the kids who came to the Holiday club could share the experience with their parents. We sang the songs they sang, played the games they played and heard the stories they heard. I loved it.

The service was followed by a Barbecue in the sunshine, which deteriorated into a water fight. I had to keep dry-ish as I had a 6pm Evensong (as someone said, from the sublime to the ridiculous!)

In the end, it was a 10 hour non-stop day, as between the two services we essentially stripped all the Pulse scenery from the church and loaded the truck. I was definitely ready for a cold one by 9pm, only to discover I'd given my last Stella to Pete from Pulse!

BGT/North Korea goes nuclear SAB

Susan Boyle Kim Jong Il

Separated at Birth MPs expenses special edition

Nick Clegg

David Cameron

Xmen special separated at birth

2 old blokes who mumble

2 blokes with nasty tempers and lovely sideburns

And I don't know whether to laugh or cry ...

h/t Mike Griffiths

So with the ransomed we ... (titter ye not)

Went to Chelmsford Cathedral today. Pretty good going - once in 2 years and now twice in a week! It was the Maundy Thursday Chrism Eucharist and renewal of ministerial vows. Since Bishop John of Chelmsford is retiring in August, this was his last go, and so it was an emotional time for him. He preached on cheap grace vs free grace, since today is the anniversary of the execution of Dietrich Boenhoeffer.

This got me thinking a lot, especially about the difference between us knowing Christ and his knowing us. Bp John was right, I think, to put the emphasis on Christ knowing us, because this puts in counterpoint the way that lots of Christians and Churches put God in a box and make him be and do what they want, (Cheap grace) not what he wants (free grace).

I suppose I was watching out for this following the recent discussion at Elizaphanian (go to the comments section) about worship, plus also because of stuff going on here, but +John's words resonated for me; it's not that I don't believe in the importance of knowing Jesus personally, but I do think too many people regard worship as entertainment for them, rather than an offering to God. Yes, some worship can be crap, but the definition of that crapness (?word) is not merely based on whether or not I like it.

I for example have posted before about how I generally don't go in for Cathedral worship, and today was no exception, but because as I just said, it was John Galdwyn's last go, it was special. It was the only time I've ever agreed with people when they clapped the sermon (although that act in itself deconstructed the sermon by showing us all seeing it as entertainment for us!) In thinking about how we at Stebbing relate to the wider community there is a growing sense that our model of church is broken; we are stuck in the mindset that people are going to come to us and join in our fun (cheap grace), instead of looking to go out with the gospel and get involved where the rest of the community are (free grace, under God's inspiration and guidance). Watch this space for more on that as "Our Vision" develops.

You can take the boy out of Salisbury, but you can't take Salisbury out of the boy; a big highlight today was spotting Martin Court, who had followed me as curate in Blandford Forum, and is now the Vicar of St Chad's Chadwell Heath. He and I therefore both began our ministry in a place where Maundy Thursday was a three-line whip, write a grovelling letter to the bishop if you can't be there type service. This will explain to you why I haven't been for the last 2 years!
The service today was pretty much the same as back in the old country, but in a smaller and slightly less formal environment. Although I was a bit taken aback it was kind of nice, more real, to have the oil sitting on gopack tables in Ikea jugs and the bishop wearing a pink Madonna style mic on his ear/cheek. I also though it was great that there was the offer of prayer for healing and anointing with oil. It was a bit of a faff to queue for the oil but at least I met some new people along the way.

On another tack, here's a joke to liven up your (otherwise holy and devout of course) day

Knock Knock
Who's there?
I done up
I done up who?

I wondered what the smell was!

You've set this captive free

Well I never watch Eastenders so was mightily surprised to spot, when I turned on the TV just now (to read on the red button about a trillion dollars), Vila from Blake's Seven playing the vicar at a wedding.

I thought that would be the most bizarre thing I saw today but then I saw this from the Ugley Vicar which just takes the biscuit. (s'pose I should h/t Rachel but she may not thank me for it!)

I always thought that chorus "I give you all the honour", when it got to "And I worship you, I give my life to you .. " sounded like the middle bit from the theme from Blake's 7.

that is what we are

Since we're having a half night of prayer tomorrow as part of the Our Vision process I will miss comic relief, so I enjoyed this today ...


In the 80's we enjoyed this in its original version in a somewhat ironic sense. I recall that "Kenny Rogers!", accompanied by a stroking of the chin, took over from "Jimmy Hill" as shorthand for "I don't believe you". Or was that Kenny Loggins, I forget.

Separated at birth II