progress

Last night saw another great evening at the pub. Deep and big discussions and some really challenging subjects.

Hot on my agenda was a more extensive conversation on some of the thoughts I posted here. We talked through how we are vulnerable to setting up and packaging Christianity as another commodity that someone some where might choose to ‘buy’. We focus on trying to explain how all the bad stuff can vanish away while we really should be working out how to come along side and live as equals with others.

Perfectly timed, Kathy Escobar posted this beautiful piece on friendship. She has followed it up with part 2.

Essential reading, and as we try to work out where we are heading next*, I think these thoughts of Kathy’s are thoughts we need to work hard to keep at the forefront of our ideas.

*where next… I think we might be moving in the neo-monastic direction, thinking through things like a daily rule and so on, but more of that another time.

peace

Tobit

so…where next?

I thought I’d attempt to write up some thoughts as a result of our conversation on Monday night (05/12).  We ranged from pub snacks (would Jesus eat pork scratchings…?!) to the profound…this time exploring where we go to next on this journey of building a community of faith around the Park.

One of the things that has become quickly apparent is that we believe profoundly that people who engage with the Park will be at all kinds of stages in their spiritual journey, and therefore also have different needs in terms of membership of a Christian community.  That’s to be celebrated.  I don’t think that we think that only one way of doing mission/church works.  Some of us are comfortable in existing models of church.  That’s good.  Some of us are feeling called out.  That’s good too.

At the same time, we don’t need to be all things to all people.  We can be different things at different times.  Different components will make up the whole story of the Park.

A second point was that we all agree that our little pub group had become one of the key places where we feel we are growing spiritually.  Something about the fact we can dialogue with each other about this stuff (God, life, mission) means that, for some of us at least, this place connects with us more than sitting in a church listening to someone else speak without the ability to respond and engage verbally.    Somehow it feels more real.  Beautifully, we can agree, disagree…we can do this stuff and have very different views and yet still be a community.

We spent a bit of time exploring what community should be and look like, a bit more time thinking on how we view the Park as a missional activity (bridge to church or growth of church itself).

So…next time…one thing we agreed on is that we’d like to break bread together – symbolic, I think, of our desire to formalise our commitment to each other.  Again, it’ll mean something different to each one of us.   But to me, that’s something of the beauty of this group of pilgrims.  We don’t do monotone.

What comes next…I don’t know.

Let’s see.

More pub, more pints, more talk, more action.

leaving the ghetto

The Northumbria Community website makes for really interesting reading:

We embrace the challenge to live as church without walls, living openly amongst unbelievers and other believers in a way that the life of God in ours can be seen, challenged or questioned. This will involve us building friendships outside our Christian ghettos or club-mentality, not with ulterior evangelistic motives, but because we genuinely care.

As we begin to articulate our ‘theology’ or, if you prefer, add some depth to our values we are embarking on the journey from our Christian ghettos. I love how Ian Adams describes this kind of thing in his book Cave. Refectory. Road. For me it feels like I have left somewhere and am now travelling to the place of stillness, prayer and withdrawal. There is a huge amount of stuff flowing around my head; ideas, views, opinions, bits of books, and so on, and while we proces some of this collectively, it will also good to take all of this to a place of personal stillness before embarking on the next bit of the journey.

Welcome to Parkology

Welcome to the Parkology Blog. What’s in a name?

Parkology is not the study of Parkour, although I admit, that would be a pretty awesome site to run… But rather, a name we have given to a collection of thoughts about a theology of being present in a local park. Day in, day out, rain or shine, we ride, run, scoot, walk, chat, paddle, think and pray. And sometimes, of an evening, we meet in our local pub to talk through things, to shape our thoughts, to give structure and to enjoy a pint or two of ale.

This blog is something of an experiment. In time I hope there will be a collection of ‘authors’ who will post reflections on our conversations, as this small missional (and maybe even new-monastic) community evolves, grows and changes.

Expect lots of conflicts in what you read, but most of all, please do engage in the conversations we are having, either here, or over at our facebook group (feel free to ask for an invite to that, its kinda tucked away!)

Thanks for stopping by, and we hope you journey with us.

Peace

Tobit