way out west

New Monasticism Questions

Ben Edson asks some questions of New-Monasticism in advance of the book launch tomorrow...

1: One comment that Martyn Percy made was that an 'an abbot' is a title rich in heritage and monasticism as a concept is one that has deep, deep roots.  Does our contemporary re-imagination of the monastic tradition violate the heritage from which it comes?  Is it too pop...

2: Is there something slightly sanctimonious about the new monasticism conversation?  Is it the bitter pill that Christians think that culture needs to swallow to make it better? Is there a genuine desire to swallow the pill and is this desire matched action?

3: Is it offering a countercultural model of community?  And if so is the best model to engage with society?

4: Does it bring people to faith?  Does it engage with the non-churched?

 

I left the following (partial) response... 

Interesting Q's Ben, though I do wonder if they are still infused with a somewhat modernist (and Evangelical ;-) ) language of evaluation - "best", "better" etc. but not much about authenticity, integrity, etc.? I'm not sure it's about being the "best" or even being a "model" but about finding ways of community and spirituality that resource and sustain a 24/7 way of living faith - so rather than seeking the "best model to engage" we simply do what we find sustains that missional and spiritual engagement and as a bonus we may find that for many who have lost the tools for being community it offers a window on a fuller way of living. I guess one could say that rather than being a "model" it could be an Icon of the God who is by nature community... also I wonder if rather than being a replacement (or solution for the ills of) the Church it could be, as Monasticism has always been the left hand to the ecclesiastical right hand of the faith? Did in the modern world we lose our connection with the monastic and seek to replace it with the Para-Church (YFC, SU, etc. even CMS!) and as that part of Christendom is in decline are we simply re-exploring what was for centuries has been part of what we know as Christianity?

I asked your 1st question to Abbots Sam (Hillfield) and Stuart (Mucknel) recently and the answer they gave was that unlike the Church which seeks to do "new things" to sustain the inherited, they believed that a) we had to release new expressions of monasticism to find new ways in a new era, b) that they wanted to learn from the new ways what the challenges, joys etc. are of the world we live in now and c) they wanted to give to us their wisdom, particularly what they have learned about community and spirituality over the centuries. They saw a line of continuum but also that like Parents there has to be a letting go in order that the child can grow toward maturity.

The Making of Modern Britain

I've been watching Andrew Marr's interesting "The Making of Modern Britain".  Lots of fascinating stuff, one section deserves a mention because of the way it flies in the face of the medias love affair with the New-Atheists particularly their simplistic view "Science=good, Religion=bad".  Marr leads with a piece on Darwin's cousin Francis Galton.  Galton, the scientist wrote in 1869 the book "Hereditary Genius" in which he says,

a man's natural abilities are derived by inheritance, under exactly the same limitations as are the form and physical features of the whole organic world. Consequently, as it is easy, notwithstanding those limitations, to obtain by careful :selection a permanent breed of dogs or horses gifted with peculiar powers of running, or of doing anything else, so it would be quite practicable to produce a highly-gifted race of men by judicious marriages during several consecutive generations.

effectively launching the idea of Eugenics into the modern world, which within 100 years led directly to the experiments of Joseph Mengele and the death camps of Nazi Germany.  Marr suggests that Galton believed that poverty could be bred out of culture, that only the upper classes should be encouraged to breed.  The programme then sets Galton in contrast to Seebohm Rowntree, the Christian, who conducted a study of poverty in York in 1899 the findings of which where published in the book "Poverty" in 1901 and, when taken up by David Lloyd George, became the seeds of British social welfare reform. 

Technorati Tags: Christianity: Culture: Media: Television

Amazing maggots!

It's long been known that Maggots can not only clean infected wounds by dissolving and eating necrotic tissue... even wriggling off the wound themselves when it is is sterile... they also secrete a "cocktail" of chemicals that fight infection... antibiotics if you like... what has just been revealed is that that secretion is capable of fighting even the toughest infections including 12l strains of MSRA and C-Difficille!

From Medical news today

The antibiotic, named Seraticin™, is derived from the maggot secretions of the common green bottle fly (Lucilia sericata) and scientists hope to develop it into an injection, pill or ointment... Scientists from Swansea University... have purified Seraticin™ and undertaken the study of its structure and the mechanism by which it prevents infection. The next steps will be to complete the identification of the compound and develop a way to synthesise it. It can then be tested on human cells and eventually in clinical trials in order to determine its medical effectiveness and properties as a novel antibiotic.

MRSA infections cause suffering, amputations and death, not to mention the estimated £1 billion cost to the NHS. Between 2002 and 2006, 6,201 deaths in England and Wales involved MRSA and 15,683 deaths in England and Wales involved C. difficile. The rapid rise in antibiotic-resistant bacteria means that scientists urgently need to find a solution.

Once again Creation proves to have the answer for man-made problems!

Technorati Tags: Culture: News

The Climate Change Jury is back in!

150 major global companies (including companies like Shell, Britsh Airways, Pirelli & Pacific Gas & Electric Company!) have issued a statement saying that the evidence for Global warming/Climate change is indisputable and world governments should legislate for binding limits on emissions for businesses!  So, the businesses themselves say that they are convinced of the problem and that they want to be held accountable for the damage to the environment and encouraged to develop new technologies.  They say that Global business needs...

a sufficiently ambitious, international and comprehensive, legally-binding United Nations agreement to reduce greenhouse gas emissions will provide business with the certainty it needs to scale up global investment in low-carbon technologies.

...and that "global targets for emission reductions should be based on science, not economic considerations".  Of course there is already a fly in the ointment, guess who!  Yes the United States of "not our problem" has issued it's own statement saying it will not support global emission limits for business!  Hmmm, no surprise there then!

Technorati Tags: environment: News

Real Night Lights...

How cool is this... ht to pomomusings

Technorati Tags: Photographs: technology

Albert Einstein said...

My religion consists of a humble admiration of the illimitable superior spirit who reveals himself in the slight details we are able to perceive with our frail and feeble mind.

The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and all science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed.

A human being is a part of a whole, called by us _universe_, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings as something separated from the rest... a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.

Technorati Tags: Culture: Spirituality

swarming in an adaptive zone!

One of the things that frustrates me in the debates that surround Emerging/Emergent Church is the need that some people  have to see a cohesive movement with leaders... Ok there are voices that are influential but most of what they say is a snapshot on their particular journey not as a manifesto... maybe this need is because so many of the anti-EC voices come from churches built around a charismatic leader and/or a churches where truth is taught from the front by an 'expert', 'anointed one' etc... anyway one term that has been flashing around the Mission world in regard to those who are exploring what it might mean to be a faith community in pm/emerging culture is 'entrepreneur'... now I have never thought of myself in those terms, it sounds a bit capitalist for my sensibilities!  But I found this passage from Ann Morisy's 'Journeying out' (2004) helpful... you may too...

Economists have already borrowed the concept of 'adaptive zones' from evolutionary biology.  Joseph Schumpeter, in particular, drew parallels with the biologists' recognition of 'adaptive zones' in his economic models.  He observed that times of economic boom occur when swarms of entrepreneurs try to implement an innovation at the same time.  However, those who enter this new space and pursue the new opportunities discover that their business models, formed and nurtured former practices and processes, are ill-adapted to cope with the new.  Those who survive, and go on to flourish in the 'adaptive zone' are those who can also transform their structures and systems to accommodate the new opportunities.

...why is this helpful to me?  Because it goes some way to explain how EC has grown... many of us who describe ourselves in the terms now associated with EC felt the way we did before we had ever heard of Emergent or Brian McLaren!  We were already swarming, trying to work out what faith could look like... the 'adaptive zone' - post-christendom, was obvious to us way before the term was common parlance... but are we entrepreneurs?

... entrepreneurs are people who see the the negative spaces left by worlds drifting apart... entrepreneurs are people who have an itch, a sense of displacement from the status quo and an excitement about future possibilities... entrepreneurs are innovative and creative... entrepreneurs are people who step into the gaps with a degree of uncertainty but prepared to take the risk... entrepreneurs are people who refuse to held back by conservatism and cautionary words... entrepreneurs have faith, they believe in what they are doing...

I guess maybe I am an entrepreneur, I believe, not in 'Emerging Church' but in God's calling to step into the gap between cultures, to look for the new wine skins... oh well back to the swarm!

Technorati Tags: Church: Emerging Church: Mission