Blog Roundup
It’s been a mad, mad week here… all sorts of stuff going on, and not much time to write. But there are a few things I’ve noticed that, for one reason or another, have touched a nerve for me. Here they are:
Sudden Death – it’s an awful, tragic thing when a young person dies suddenly and unexpectedly. Here’s an article about it.
Autism and Employment – a heartening story
Church website design. I’m
in the middle of having my site completely redesigned by a fab young
genius I met recently. But who knew the whole world of Church websites
was so interesting…
Examiners (human ones that is) may become redundant if this new computer examination stuff passes muster. Not sure whether to be happy or sad about that. I’m not convinced a computer is a good judge (it might be more accurate in some respects, but can a computer spot flair, ingenuity, imagination?) but having just signed up for a round of examining, the idea of NOT marking scripts is strangely appealing.
the first Fresh Expressions church to be created outside the parish system (apparently)
The irresistible aspects of the Anglicans-to-Rome story
Last of all, squeezed in between all the other stuff going on here at the minute, I find myself back in touch with two guys I played music with in my teens. We’ve been out of touch for a long long time, and suddenly here we are planning a bit of a reunion. With guitars of course. Here’s one of the tunes I learned from them when I was about 13.
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author musician theologian
Maggi has kept a blog since September 2003, writing about theology and faith, the arts and literature, and a little about life and random nonsense...
In an increasingly secularised society few people have a good working knowledge of the Bible. Yet a great deal of our culture is built on stories or ideas that come from the Bible. Literature, art, music, language and even the fabric of our society - such as our justice system - are built on Christian concepts and biblical references. The Writing on the Wall provides a fascinating introduction to the Bible's best-known, and most influential, stories. Each chapter gives some background to the text of the Bible, and shows how the stories have become enmeshed in Western culture. Adam and Eve, the ten plagues of Egypt, The Prodigal Son and Mary Magdalene all feature - along with how the Bible has influenced everyone from Shakespeare to Monty Python, and Caravaggio to Banksy. 
Giving It Up explores the Lenten idea of 'giving up', taking it beyond the traditional idea of simply abstaining from something, and suggesting instead that what we need to give up is our existing ideas about God. With a daily readings for each day of Lent, from Ash Wednesday to Easter Sunday, it follows the heroes of the Bible who had to give up their own too-small ideas about God.
This is Maggi’s bestselling book of daily readings for each day of Advent, Christmas and Epiphany. Advent is the beginning of the Church year, and marks the anticipation of the coming Messiah. These readings explore how beginnings and endings in our own lives are illuminated by the different Gospel narratives of Christ's coming.
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That autism and employment story is heartening. Having just had to resign (yet again) from an office-based job (that didn’t need to be — web design can be done anywhere) I’ve realised that I never had a problem working in an office in France, but always have done in the UK. I can even deal with the phone better in France. Whether the culture is more accepting of those on the autistic spectrum I can’t say, but whatever it is seems to work much better for me.
As for church web design — it would be lovely to have online services and even photos of services, but so many people won’t be photographed or recorded these days. And then people start fussing over copyright issues (sigh). So we’re stuck with a fairly basic static website, but it’s mostly good enough, and the Vicar’s happy, so that’s enough for me.
Thanks for that, moonlight lady. You gotta love JT.