No Comment
sorry blog readers, for some reason my blog won’t take comments at the moment. Normal service will be resumed ASAP. Hold that thought! …
No Responses to “No Comment”
Comments
-
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.
-
Search
-
-
Hear, Hear. At least it’s good to see that so many people see Christianity as something important enough to attack.
I just think its a resurgence of modernism.
I’ve read a few things recently that pretty much amount to the old modernist vs. postmodernist arguments. It sometimes feels like the modernists are giving notice: “OK, you’ve had your fun. Now lets get back to reality.”
The backlash is coming and we need to be ready.
Now… what the hell was “Russell’s teapot” again?
I think, partly, the right response is uninterest. If we jump to the defence of Christianity everytime some half-brained hack author releases an ill-researched best-seller, i think we betray our own insecurity… or at least our conviction that we expect the general public to be silly enough to believe it all.
I think the success of things like the Da Vinci Code lies not in its believability, but simply in that people love a nice consipracy theory.
And people are fascinated with the Church, which they may not understand, and which is shrouded in centuries of mystery.
Last week, I was Lighting Designer/ operator for a college production of David Hare’s Racing Demon. A brilliant play about the Church of England in the 1990s, it still resonates with audiences today… Those of us in the CofE cringed at how close to the bone it was, and those with no knowledge of the Church, to my suprise, also found it truely fascinating!