jonnybaker

time to grow some gills

this is a somewhat delayed blog post. when september arrived it felt like there was a deflated mood. i think it was because it was a new school year and we had imagined we might have moved on but it was clear that was not going to be the case. it might be a long winter ahead and now of course we are in a second lockdown.

i was really helped to name this feeling by chatting with a friend tina who said to me that initially it was like we were holding our breath but now we realised we needed to grow some gills! in other words we've got to adapt and live in this environment as we are going to be in it for a while. 

we took that idea at the september grace and had a liturgy/prayer we constructed together on zoom by inviting people to write a line in the chat in response to the idea. these were then knocked into an order which we read together. it's a fairly unusual liturgy but i really liked it (and will add to the worship tricks list)

We are so used to being able to fix things quickly
Our social systems, wealth and technology were going to get us through
“One step at a time,” I thought.
“Stay the course,” I thought.
“Steady on,” I thought.
We thought we were just holding our breath
But it’s time to grow gills

This time is unstable, characterised by inconsistent rules and u-turns.
It is hard to plan ahead.
How can a divided society heal when we can’t even be present in the same room?
Isolated from friends and family, having to find new ways to connect
Give us grace
Hold us when we feel we can’t go on
We thought we were just holding our breath
But it’s time to grow gills

As we are held underwater,
help our ears tune in to new sounds and frequencies
Gill growers who know who they are in water
May we learn to see in a new element,
unafraid to keep our eyes open
We thought we were just holding our breath
But it’s time to grow gills

Let us dedicate this involuntary fast to the Lord
Help us find a new way to carry on
Renew our hope
Turn our fear and retreat into discovery and joy
Renew us
We though we were just holding our breath
But it’s time to grow gills

a communion prayer - jesus and the powers

i wrote a communion prayer for grace on saturday...

Eucharist: Jesus and the powers

Thank you for your incredible life. 

You announced a new kingdom at the margins of the world, 
an offensive against the strongholds of oppression, 
and the dawn of liberation. 

You made a way in the wilderness. 

You proclaimed good news of the kingdom, 
brought healing and deliverance, 
lived a life of nonviolent confrontation with the powers. 

You restored social wholeness to the sick and “impure”. 
You tore down the boundaries of tribe, gender, skin tone, religion, disability and ill health. 
You overturned the dynamics of status and honour 
to make way for the outcast Jew and alien gentile. 

With you there is no longer male or female, slave or free, Jew or gentile.
Patriarchy, slavery and racism have no place in your kingdom.
All are made in God’s image, 
all are welcome, 
all are included in your “last as first” revolution.

Almost every ruling faction in society opposed you. 
Your resistance was through loving enemies, 
non violence, 
story telling,
truth telling, 
meals with the wrong people, 
refusing to live under the domination of the powers and their way of ordering life.

You chose love and not fear 
pursuing kingdom practice even at the cost of death. 
Ultimately they did put you to death. 
You were lynched and hung on a tree. 

In a great mystery and a great reversal 
you overcame the powers on the cross. 
Three days later you were raised from death, 
a sign that the powers have been defeated, 
a sign of hope, 
a sign of a future kingdom when all will be well. 
You shattered the powers’ reign of death in history.

When we forget, help us to remember. 
When we are blind help us to see. 
When we are deaf help us to hear. 
When we despair and are overwhelmed send your Spirit to comfort us.

You call us to a conversion of heart,
to turn away from empire, its seductions and iniquity.
This is not a call out of the world, but into an alternative social practice,
a community of resistance and healing, 
gathering in homes and around the table with you. 

You have given us a meal to remember you by
a meal to remember the ending of slavery 
and deliverance from the power of Pharaoh’s dream;
a meal in which you broke bread and drank wine - 
your body broken for us, 
your blood of a new relationship with God.

May our homes and our tables be open, 
May they not have rigid boundaries. 
May this table and this home today be such a place. 
May we live from love and not fear. 

We break bread and drink wine now to celebrate your life, death and resurrection.
And we look for the day when all slavery, all oppression and all domination is ended.
When we will be free at last
Your kingdom come
Amen

we'll post the whole service on the grace site at some point and i'll come back and post a link here. if you are interested in what is behind this take, things in the background are probably multiple but some that spring to mind:

• mark's gospel and his telling of jesus' life - i have been very inspired by ched myers binding the strong man which i have blogged about elsewhere. there are some lines of the above prayer that are phrases directly lifted from his wonderful commentary. i really hope he would like this prayer.
• the current wider context and the challenge of making sense of the powers and their domination as exemplified in the murder of george floyd and in the continual ordering of political and economic life to favour the wealthy and powerful at the expense of the earth and those at the edges. for me the wider context is also about religious power which too easily slides towards control and/or domesticating jesus. i am not against institutions or power as such - it is where there is domination that is the issue.
• subversive meals by alan streett who reads the lord's supper as an anti-imperial practice (which is picked up on by kreider and kreider in worship after christendom). 
• walter wink's trilogy on the powers and alastair mcintosh's take on that in soil and soul.
• james cone's the cross and the lynching tree which i have just read (thank you emma for the suggestion) - the prayer uses the word lynched challenged by this book. we reflected on this image of the black christ at grace which is from a book of poems the black christ by countee cullen published in 1929 which james cone refers to in the amazing chapter on the arts. if you want a short summary of the idea of jesus being lynched then chance the rapper's twitter thread does a nice job.

i am adding this to the worship trick series 4 - that will be no 79 - i must try and get to 100 before it's been a decade that that series has been running!

godisnowhere reflection

a reflection/piece of liturgy i wrote for grace last night. i have been struck looking at the stories of the resurrection appearances how grief and hope are often close together, and how often god’s absence and presence are experienced in the same stories. perhaps this has something to say to us in our own experience at the moment - many of us have felt god is far away and many of us have been reassured by god’s presence.

The women arrive at the empty tomb
God is nowhere
Suddenly Jesus meets them
God is now here

Mary weeping with loss in the garden
God is nowhere
The gardener speaks her name
God is now here

The disciples afraid in a locked room
God is nowhere
Then Jesus appears
God is now here

Thomas refusing to believe
God is nowhere
He touches Jesus wounds
God is now here

The disciples fish all night without a catch
God is nowhere
“Throw your net over the right side”
God is now here

Peter shattered when the cock crows
God is nowhere
A healing conversation on the beach
God is now here

Two disciples downcast on the Emmaus Rd
God is nowhere
They recognised him in the breaking of bread
God is now here

GODISNOWHERE

hand washing ritual

grace's easter vigil went well - like so many others we were feeling our way with the technology running it online and quickly worked out that our usual music background didn't work! i hope it went well for people who followed along on the hashtag #graceeastervigil2020 in either twitter or instagram. a big plus was having people join in who were in other countries! the communion prayer is here

it was really good fun having steve leach dj at the end live on facebook and it's still there if you want to have a listen. he played an amazing tune of his with the queen's speech mixed in which i loved. 

as ever we invited people to create bits of content. i thought one was really worth sharing here as a worship trick. gill created a hand washing ritual in response to one of the readings. it is on the grace web site and has a prayer that goes along with the various kinds of washing. it's really lovely. i have put it on my phone so i can dig it out each time i wash my hands. anyway you might like it. 

there was also a really good playlist at least for my taste and i thought it suited the mood of the vigil perfectly (ht mike rose) which is on spotify and apple music 

share communion in your own home and resist the power of religious control

when christ dies on the cross the curtain in the temple is ripped from top to bottom. that curtain guarded the way into the place that only the priests could go. it is a sign that the religious power controlling access to god is ended. the way is open. in some mysterious way christ’s non violent resistance disarms the powers including the power of religious domination.

while in new zealand i read binding the strong man by ched myers. it is a brilliant commentary on mark’s gospel story of the life of jesus christ. i found it compelling. he sees jesus’ life as one of non violent resistance to the powers that oppress and dominate people. in the foreword to the twentieth anniversary edition hendricks describes it as nothing less than a project to rewild the church. i should have read it years ago.

there are two powers that jesus contends with - the imperial power of rome and the religious power of jerusalem.

myers tees up the narrative by saying that these two powers are highlighted in stories where people are oppressed by an evil spirit. the first is in the synagogue where an unclean spirit says to jesus ‘why are you interfering with us’? this is a pretty perceptive question because within the first few chapters of mark jesus has interfered with the way the religious world is controlled and organised by breaking laws of the sabbath, healing people, suggesting that god has come to those who the religious world deems unclean - touching lepers, eating with ‘scum’ tax collectors, touching a woman who is unclean through bleeding, blind beggars, gentiles and the list goes on. he messes with what is clean and dirty. within three chapters the heavies from jerusalem have been sent up to investigate and accuse jesus of being possessed by the devil. and so it goes on from there. jesus does not mince his words when he confronts the religious authorities about how they burden and oppress people. his stark warning to his followers is ‘beware the yeast of the pharisees’. this all eventually comes to a head in jerusalem where jesus turns the tables in the temple which is the heart of the religious ordering and system which is ripping off the poor, and while the disciples are admiring the building he says that within a generation it will be destroyed. and sure enough that is exactly what happens. as myers puts it “jesus now offers a vision of the end of the temple-based world, and the dawn of a new one in which the powers of domination have been toppled.”

the second story is where jesus crosses a lake and encounters a man who is oppressed by ‘legion’. myers says that can only be heard as a reference to roman military power by readers that somehow dominates this man’s life so that he is in chains. jesus frees him from this domination. jesus is ultimately executed by this state power. it’s hard to say how much they perceive him to be a threat. today is good friday when we remember christ’s death which was at the hands of the imperial state and the religious authorities who colluded together. but my own take is that the real anger and drive for it came from the religious authorities. it was their world that jesus threatened so much.

the opening lines in mark’s gospel are about a way - preparing a way. jesus life shows a radical alternative way. i have always found this way amazing and inspirational - i have often noticed how many people like jesus but are put off by the church. in my own clunky way i want to follow him in that way. and i have been stirred up by this notion that to follow in that way is to live in a way of non-violence, of activism, and of resistance to the powers of domination. it is a way that has at its heart a vision for a different kind of world (kingdom as jesus calls it) of peace, of cancelling debts, of love, healing and non judgement, and fairness for all that welcomes those who the powers exclude precisely because all are god’s children. god is not the preserve of the wealthy, powerful and religious.

i was thinking about these powers in relation to colonialism while i was in new zealand and i will come back to that in another post. but today i am thinking about religious powers of domination and control in the church and in particular the church of england of which i am a life long member and a lay pioneer minister.

in a previous post i suggested we need more imagination and less control especially as people seek to be creative online in how they worship and pray and do community. these are challenging times and as i said in a previous post there is a lot of good work and practice going on. but the lockdown has brought home to me just how far we stray at times from the way of christ in the church. it is the sharing of communion in particular that has vexed me this week. 

jesus instituted a meal with friends where bread and wine are shared and people have done that ever since in homes and churches to remember christ. jesus life was one where he was always in trouble over meals - he ate with the wrong people who were always welcome at his table, though he usually was round theirs.

fast forward to coronavirus and the church is holding online eucharist services with guidelines that the only people who can share the bread and wine in their homes are bishops and priests. everyone else can watch apparently! so for easter day for example which is a day when all are encouraged to take communion suggested activities are:

Some bishops and priests may wish to celebrate Holy Communion in their homes.

Practising spiritual communion as this is a day on which all ought otherwise to receive Holy Communion in church.

spiritual communion is explained here - and is for situations where you can't share bread and wine. in many cases i suspect and indeed i hope that those leading the service will not have it but use the absence of sharing bread and wine to reflect on this moment of separation. and some will choose not to have services of communion which is probably a good option if you want to obey the guidelines. the idea that just the priests would have communion i find unbelievable both in itself and that it could be in print in public - i did a double take to check i was reading it right. this makes it both exlusive and a rite of exclusion! surely the obvious thing to do and what everyone will want to do and i hope will do is to share bread and wine in their own homes to remember christ. it saddens me that the church has not got the imagination to say this is healthy practice. there is a regulation in the canons of the church (scroll down to b5) that gives discretion to ministers for unusual circumstances to lead worship that is different. for example they may...

on occasions for which no provision is made... use forms of service considered suitable for those occasions and may permit another minister to use the said forms of service.

we are in such an occasion surely! so i hope ministers act anyway.

the church has a lot of regulations about communion - what prayers, who can preside, where it can take place and so on. in grace we have found these frustrating and sought permission to use other prayers and write our own which we have done over the years. we have respected having someone preside who is ordained when we meet in st mary's church as we are part of the church of england. one curious regulation is that a place needs to be authorised if it's not a consecrated building like a church. so whenever we meet in homes we regularly share bread and wine in a simple informal way usually as part of a meal and concluded those ordained should not preside because the buildings have not got the permission - i know it's nuts. bishops are likely to have had to give permission for priests to lead communion from their homes online i suspect! i have written about grace's approach in the introduction to making communion if you are interested. the church of england says on the one hand that it values creativity, that the shape and integrity of worship is what is important and not the words in themselves and we need new ways of doing things but in practice it is still extremely controlled and locked down.

the church has various justifications through sacramental theology and other clever sounding ruses. but really it is an issue of control. these are things the church has constructed, made up, nothing more and i can't help thinking they are in direct opposition or at least massively out of kilter to the way of christ. how do you get from what he did to what the church is saying at this time? it's completely baffling. beware the yeast of the pharisees. the curtain in the temple seems to have been stitched back together. the central structures of the church of england have somehow created a scenario in which there is a priestly caste who control access to god because it is only through their magic actions that people can have communion, bread and wine to remember christ. if one of them is not in your home tough. it's absurd! the religious power of domination is alive. 

i refuse to collude with it. it’s power was disarmed by christ’s death on the cross. i will be happily remembering the story of christ and sharing bread and wine online with others in grace and in my own home with jenny. this is we note from the guidelines not going to be an official church of england communion. but we will be making communion. i hope there are homes and indeed vicars up and down the country who ignore the church’s guidelines on this. i get to go to various meetings in the church of england where the rhetoric is that the church is committed to mission, to lay ministry (that means people who are not ordained) and the vision of the church is to empower all of its people with a vision called ‘setting god’s people free’. how are we supposed to take that seriously?!

some years back at another time when i was bumping into the religious power of domination in the church of england in another way, i made an art installation called red tape in which i ring fenced the table with barrier tape and bound the bible in red tape and wrapped a dog collar in red tape. i couldn't help thinking about it again today...

from my experience of communion in homes over the years, a simple way to do it is to do so in a meal and share bread and wine either between courses or at the end. give space to tell the story of christ in some way and to remember his life. death and resurrection. invite participation and conversation, use one of the stories from the gospels, maybe one of the meals jesus is at. have a prayer of thanksgiving - the official church ones are online, you can find one you like from elsewhere - such as the iona community or grace, or someone can improvise one. if you improrvise it it helps to have an idea of the shape of those kinds of prayers. in our grace easter vigil we will be using a thanksgiving prayer for easter written by the st hilda community and janet morley which has really lovely words. then give some space to share and pray for one another. it's not hard!

bathing in light

it was a wonderful grace last night led by beyond from brighton.

st mary's in ealing is a beautiful space and it was perfect for lasers, smoke and incense bathing the building in light as we celebrated a eucharist of light. it included a wander round to gaze on the amazing installations of light.

in the same way you 'break bread' we also broke light with some glow sticks!

it all looked very beautiful so i took some photos of course though it was a bit challenging in the low light! i have added an album on flickr - grace eucharist of light

we return the favour and will be visiting beyond on may 3 to lead an evening for them in brighton. 

grace does planetary mass

i am in two minds as to whether to put this out there but last saturday with extinction rebeliion in full flow and a focus on the planet for grace we gathered round the table. some members had been in to join in the action - sadly i couldn't make it due to work. so we gathered to pray for our world, to remember it is god's world and lament the ways it is being pushed to its limits. i have a recording of the planetary mass from the nine o clock service. i can't remember where i got it from but i have always loved it and play it to students as an example of creative liturgy. it must be from the early nineties. anyway i transcribed it which i have never done and we read through it together and shared bread and wine round the table. it was without the visuals and drama but poignant and powerful. if anyone is reading who was involved in its creation thank you - and i hope it's ok to put this on my blog. but here is the liturgy and i have added tracks we listened to. the soil by david benjamin blower was perfect for passing round bread and wine and we brought soil and water to the table along with bread and wine.

i'd love to hear of what other laments and liturgies anyone else is creating or using. 

Welcome and Opening Prayer
Listen to planetary mass 0-3:09

The planetary mass is our celebration of life and our ritual of celebration and repentance on behalf of our culture. Here we seek to mourn the destruction of so much life on our planet and to cultivate a compassion that feels in our own flesh the wounds inflicted on others and on our planet and to awaken to the incredible awe and beauty of our existence with God. Whether humanity has a future or whether it is going to become extinct in the next few centuries depends on our will to live and that means our absolute will for our one indivisible life. We have got used to death, at least to the death of other creatures and other people and to get used to death is the beginning of freezing into lifelessness itself. So the essential thing is to affirm life, the life of other creatures, the life of other people, our own lives.

The Lord is here
His Spirit is with us

Breathe in the Holy Spirit…
Breathe in life
And out fear
In passion
And out numbness
In hope
And out death

The Word
Wisdom let us attend. From the book of Deuteronomy:
This day I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death,
blessing and curses. Now choose life so that you and your children may live and that you may love the Lord your God, listen to His voice and hold fast to Him.

This is the word of the Lord
Thanks be to God

Read Declaration of Rebellion from This is Not A Drill

Confession
Creator God the Source of all life we confess our sin to you.
We confess where we have turned away from you and where in ignorance we have turned our back on the earth and on each other.
We confess that as we have wanted more and more we have dominated and exploited your creation.
And we admit that we are responsible for abusing the riches of our home, that we are complicit in crucifying you by polluting the air and the sea, by destroying the forests, by starving the people of the two-thirds world, and by robbing the future generations of life not yet here, our children and grandchildren.
God of all creation we turn away from our addiction
We turn back to you
Our Source and our Hope
We repent and we turn back to you

Communion
This ritual is a symbol of the worship already happening in creation. The whole universe is invited to this intimate event, the feasting on Christ. The church here has no walls - we worship with plants, planets, animals, and angels.

The day before Christ suffered he took bread in sacred hands and looking up to heaven he broke it and gave it to his disciples saying ‘take eat this is my body which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me’. In the same way after supper he took the cup and gave thanks. He gave it to them saying ‘drink this all of you. This is my blood of the new covenant which is shed for you and for many for the forgiveness of sins. Do this to recall me, to remember me.’

Creator and soul of the cosmos
The universe shines with your life Lord
You’re everything we desire.
We give our lives to you
You created everything that lives
Through Christ you are the Source
We believe and trust in you
Our desire is to let go of death and give ourselves to the vision of life your son Jesus believed in to the point of his own death
We commit ourselves to him
Spirit of life, integrity and truth who raised our brother from death and gives us hope beyond death here now
You are our strength and compassion
We believe and trust in you

God of life we bring wine to the table
Touch this now to become a life blood transfusion.
Christ our life we bring bread to the table to become your precious flesh
In our global village we offer it in the presence of those who starve.
Eternal source we offer water:
The overwhelming swell of the oceans unique to this planet.
Creator God we thank you for the gift of soil:
The foundation of the forest, the sign of our mortality
Creator God we offer ourselves along with these elements of bread and wine and join with the voice of the whole universe crying out for life and healing.
Father hear our prayer through Jesus Christ.
Amen

We can no longer see ourselves as separate from nature.
We are all given a chance to participate in the story of the universe.
We’re all in it together - people, particles and God.
Through Christ hope is built into the very fabric of space time and matter.
So now there’s hope.
Now contains the possibility of resurrection.
So let’s come to the table now and let’s reconnect with Christ,
hope of the cosmos,
the power to renew us and change our lives now.

[share bread and wine
play The Soil by David Benjamin Blower during distribution]

Prayer
Let us pray together now for the universal church and the world.
Christ our hope at this critical time lead us into facing our denial.
As the church, as a culture wake us up to an awareness of the responsibility and opportunities we now have.
We honour the wisdom gained by centuries of spiritual and artistic endeavour through the experience of our mystics and the lives and deaths of all our saints.
We pray for an open church that celebrates the coming together of all faith and wisdom traditions, the sciences and the arts.
We pray for a new time of hope, mystery and promise as we bring all these riches to bear on our global crisis.
God the Mother and Father of all creation we pray that a new way of living emerges out of the present reductionist system that’s robbed the world of its spirit and turned human beings into objects and nature into a machine.
We pray for a culture that allows us to live in harmony with all creation and stops crippling the earth’s diversity.
We pray that your Spirit of passionate life that raised Christ from the dead bursts now into all people in our earth community.
Creator God we pray that we will wake up to a new consciousness.

Watch Greta Thurbnberg and George Monbiot video

Listen to Numbers by Radiohead

Blessing
May Holy Wisdom whose voice calls all to the feast
Whose hand draws the whole cosmic community of life to her table,
preserve you in eternal life.
And the blessing of God Creator, Liberator and Holy Spirit be amongst you and stay with you always
Amen

The mass has ended
Go in peace

[All liturgy is from The Planetary Mass by the Nine O Clock Service]

the god of unwelcome

Unwelcome!

God is here
His Spirit is with us
[but not with them]

so opened last night's provocative liturgy at grace responding to the usa and uk climates of fear and shoring up borders to those from other countries. the start was a liturgy of unwelcome which included the unveiling of an icon of the god of unwelcome which was a reworking of rublev but with the faces of trump, pence and bannon - it was disturbing! we had scriptures reassuring us that god is on our side and will destroy enemies and sang a song to the god of unwelcome which included these verses...

Excluding God
Excluding God
You love me
but not my neighbour
Excluding god

Unwelcoming God
Unwelcoming God
Close the door
Ring fence the table
Unwelcoming god

we then had take two which was a liturgy of welcome and included similar things. the highlight for me was meg wroe's amazing rework of rublev's icon with the three as migrants. we discussed together when we exclude and seem to follow a tribal god rather than the god of the whole world and all peoples recognising that there is a judge or pharisee in all of us as well as someone longing to be christlike with an open home and table. here is a link to the service in the grace archive including the unwelcome icon! and here is a pdf of it for anyone interested - it draws on several prayers, songs liturgy from other grace services. i really enjoyed and was challenged by the experience both of planning and then leading grace. and i long to follow in the way of the god and christ of welcome rather than whatever unholy gods seem to be centre stage right now. i am making this liturgy a worship trick - 69 in series 4.

[massive thanks to jon birch for the icon of unwelcome and meg wroe for the icon of welcome]

hope is near - proost and advent

proost is actually organised slightly earlier than usual this year for advent season. and there are some great new resources. i think we are likely to use seeking light at grace (though yet to be discussed). anyway here's the proost update with info and links

As we approach the season of Advent we are reminded again that we wait for God to come to us.  We wait in hope for we know that the presence of God with us - that we remember in the birth of Jesus - is transformative in ways that we can only begin to imagine.  We wait in hope.

Writing his seminal book 'God in the Manger' Dietrich Bonhoeffer considered the amazing hope of the birth of Christ.  

"God is not ashamed of the lowliness of human beings. God marches right in. He chooses people as his instruments and performs his wonders where one would least expect them. God is near to lowliness; he loves the lost, the neglected, the unseemly, the excluded, the weak and broken.” 

Sometimes we cry out to God 'How Long Lord?" as we wait for him. But we wait in hope.

Sometimes we wait expectantly knowing that God will be with us. But we wait in hope.

Sometimes we wait in confusion.  Unsure what will happen next. But we wait in hope.

All of our writers here on Proost know and share these emotions and experiences.  We are all human beings.  We know suffering and we know joy.  We hope the resources we share on this website may bring hope to you in whatever you face this Advent.

We are pleased and thrilled to share 'Seeking Light' by Ian Adams.  The latest in his series of season reflections - this time focused on Advent, Christmas and Ephiphany.  If you've not encountered Ian's work before then do have a look.  If you have then you'll know this will be a wonderful accompaniment to Advent.

We are also thrilled to share two new pieces of work from Tim Watson.  Journey to the Inward Wild is Tim's second in the Hymnal to the Wild series.  Bursting with beautiful poems it's an honest, vulnerable and hopeful read.  These poems are perfect to accompany your own devotionals and worship or to read for pleasure or share with others.  We are also pleased to share a free resource Advent Thoughts - a series of simple slides taking us through the season.  This is free so what do you have to lose ! 

Advent is a season where Proost has featured many resources to help with your own journey to Christmas.  These are available in our back-catalogue and through the Seasons button in the menu.  On the frontpage we feature three highlights - Alt.Advent (Jon Birch), We Who Still Wait (a collaboration of Chris Goan, Si Smith, Ian Adams and Steve Broadway) and then People Walking in Darkness (a movie from Grace.)  Do check these and other Advent items on the site.

Lastly the best way to access the site remains our Get it All subscription, still only £60.  Perfect for you but also as a gift to someone else.  Take a look.

Thanks for reading.  May your advent season be filled with hope. 

proost - new resources

news from proost on new resources and old resources bundled together! i am a massive fan of si smith and have tried to get hold of his rage despair hope work for a long time so glad to see it finally land!

As October rolls into the beginnings of Winter so it's time for us to ramp up things here at Proost.

In the coming weeks you'll be seeing our Advent resources featured and you can look out for new material from Ian Adams amongst others.  We're also busy completing our first Proost Fanzine - a downloadable PDF or EBook sharing poetry, prayers, ideas and features as well as some surprises.  Watch out for more here soon.

So as this time we have some things to finish off and some features to share.

We've focused this summer on receiving and encouraging material from new artists.  Many of you have sent in material which we're looking through and hope to feature some of in the New Year.  We've also published some artists new to Proost.  Rage, Hope, Despair is the amazing multimedia resource looking at Job and created by Youthscape.  If you've not seen this yet do take a look as it's one of the most dynamic things we've ever hosted here on Proost.  It also features illustrations from Si Smith.  

We also featured new poetry from Kiwi Mark Laurent and we've been thrilled to hear your responses.  

Today we launch creations from two new Proost artists.  Openings by The Many is an amazing collaboration of music, prayers and ritual first premiered at the Wild Goose Festival in North Carolina, USA in 2016.  We are thrilled to work with Gary Rand and see this resource on Proost.  

We also are launching Poetic Justice by Rachel Edge.  Rachel contacted us in the summer and we loved her poems - she has a gift for the metaphor and creates a wonderful collection of poems which we think you'll love.  

Finally we were amazed by the recent UK reaction to our Box Sets of physical books and so have launched one more .... the Proost Poetry Box Set.  These four physical books feature some of the best of Proost poetry including our best seller Learning to Love and work from Chris Goan, Ned Lunn and Tim Watson.  Stock is limited so let us know if you want one.  Due to postal costs this is a UK offer only but if you're from outside the UK do email us at [email protected] and we can let you know costs of postage to your location.

 

a little child will lead them

leading the communion service at greenbelt for several thousand people is a challenge - the scale of it but also doing something that is both creative and appeals to a wide range of people - i know as i have led it a couple of times! this year was one of the best all built around the simple idea of children leading it. this included the sermon slot where the archbishop of canterbury was aksed questions by children on his role and on the passages. the favourite question seemed to be who would win in a fight between him and the pope! anyway greenbelt and andrew graystone (who put it together) have made the liturgy and resources available here - a little child will lead them - thank you greenbelt! i am making this a worship  trick. 

do have a look at one day - a piece of liturgy that managed to be profound and hilarious at the same time...

and this is all worship trick 66 in series 4

grace seeds - confession, affirmation, communion prayer

last night's grace was on the theme of seeds and a lovely communion service. these are a few of the prayers that those of us planning it wrote - and i am adding them as a worship trick - 65 in series 4...

a confession:

Gardener God

Forgive us for the times we have kept our seeds in the packet

For the times we’ve been too scared to risk, too selfish to love, too embarrassed to try

Gardener God, have mercy on us

 

Forgive us for where we have let weeds grow in the soil of our lives

For the times we have forgotten to pray,

for the days when we don’t bother to listen,

for the moments when we neglect the stirring of your spirit

Gardener God, have mercy on us

 

Forgive us for when we have trampled on the seedlings of others

Through careless words or outright criticism,

through envy or feeling threatened,

through being insensitive or wrapped up in ourselves

Gardener God, have mercy on us

 

Forgive us for when we think it’s all down to us

When we forget that to grow we need the earth of our community,

The water of other people’s contribution,

The sunshine of your favour,

The nutrients that come through conversation and challenge

Gardener God, have mercy on us

Amen

affirmation (based on the grace ethos/values create, participate, risk, engage):

We believe in the Creator who imagined this world 

And then made it with all its earthy glory

Who made us in God’s image

With the same gift of imagination

Made to CREATE

To look after the earth and develop its resources

 

We believe in Jesus the Son of God

Who most perfectly embodied that God like image

He was able to see what God was doing and join in

Participating in the overflow of God’s love for the world

Who call us to PARTICIPATE

In the the same love for the world

 

We believe in the Spirit of Life 

Who animates us with the breath of God

Who assures us that we are God’s children

Who calls us to RISK 

To offer up the gifts we have been given

 

We believe that one day God will make all things new

While we wait we will ENGAGE

In our communities, our neighbourhoods and our workplaces

Bringing foretastes of that new creation now

Sharing the good news of God’s wonderful Kingdom

Amen

communion prayer:

Unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground a dies it remains a single seed 

but if it dies it will produce lots of wheat. 

 

Wheat is ground to make flour 

Flour is mixed with water, salt and yeast to make bread.

 

Bread is your body

Your body is broken

For healing

 

Unless a grape pip falls to the ground and dies it remains a single seed 

but if it dies it will produce lots of grapes on the vine. 

 

Grapes are crushed to make juice

Juice is mixed with water, yeast and sugar to make wine.

 

Wine is your blood

Your blood is poured out 

For forgiveness

 

Thank you so much for gifts of bread and wine to remember you by

Thank you so much for being the seed that fell to the ground and died 

that we might have new life

Send your Spirit on these gifts

 

Come to the table 

You are welcome if you are waiting 

You are welcome if you are buried

You are welcome if you are hidden

You are welcome if nothing’s happening

You are welcome if you are growing

You are welcome if you are flourishing

All are welcome at God’s table,

especially those who know they are poor, weak and broken.

God is here, the One who makes the seed grow

Amen

words of hope

i have read a stack of books this year and always mean to mention them on the blog and don't seem to get round to it so alongside editing photos from the summer in the next month i'll add a few books i have read that i think worth a mention...

first up words of hope from amos trust is a collection of prayers and liturgies and reflections - it's delightful and poignant. amos trust is small human rights organisation challenging injustice and cultivating hope. the words capture their spirituality wonderfully well. it's such a refreshing change to read words that you can echo an agreement to in your own heart. i find the arriculation of spirituality in much contemporary worship is either very focused on individual relationship with god or on proclaiming how great jesus is on a throne in the sky. it's harder to find songs and prayers of longing and anger and hope that relate to the world we actually live in.

the book is available here

this book is a reminder to me of the importance of communities and movements articulating a mission spirituality not just in mission statements and branding and in news stories but also in prayers, liturgies, poetry, art and longings that are expressed soulfully. it is of course what proost has been about and is about for years!

margins to mainstream, mainstream to margins

a couple of weeks back i was invited to lead the opening worship/reflection/prayer at the fresh expressions gathering at southwark cathedral. (the last time i led anything there was with grace at the time of our lives festival in 2000!) the title of the conference was from margins to mainstream which i think is provocative - i am certainly trying to get the gravity flowing in the other direction in most of what i do. anyway i posted something in facebook about what those at the margins might say by way of blessing to the mainstream and vice versa. of course lots of people refused to play the game and deconstruct the whole thing which i get. but anyway i asked harry baker to take what had been said and weave the comments into a blessing which he did. several people have asked for it so it's posted below. 

the worship pieces for those who asked were 

but in silence by flock (chris and harry) which led into silence

before the silence i shared that the reading for the day was one phrase 'christ with us' inspired by sam wells latest book (which is amazing btw) a nazereth manifesto in which he says the word 'with' is the most important theological word. during the silence i shared some images of christ to reflect on that notion of christ with those at the margins and those at the mainstream - christ the king which i suggested was a mainstream image, and christ the migrant a more marginal representation (i like this take of the holy family as boat people). 

we then prayed by writing prayers on luggage labels with the word hope on one side and grief on the other - and placed them in a suitcase to offer prayers for the journey in whichever direction of travel we were heading (margins to mainstream, mainstream to margins).

and then harry concluded with this blessing

Margins to Mainstream, Mainstream to Margins
Mainstream to Margins, Margins to Mainstream

Can you hear me?
Lean a little closer.
Let’s talk!
Would you like a cup of tea?
We need you and we want you.
Wish you were here!

Margins to Mainstream, Mainstream to Margins
Mainstream to Margins, Margins to Mainstream

I Inhabit both and I don't feel at home in either
One persons margin is another persons mainstream
One person's edge is another person's centre.
Some of us were made to be edge-dwellers
We are all on the margins of something
Let us do our thing
We are so very much more than a label.
There's enough God for everyone
Come inside and learn from previous mistakes.
Come outside and learn from something new.

Margins to Mainstream, Mainstream to Margins
Mainstream to Margins, Margins to Mainstream

May we be open to embrace other people’s margins
May we be open to embrace them into our mainstream
Some of us were made to be edge-dwellers
Some of us are at home in the centre.
Margins to Mainstream, Mainstream to Margins
May we be open to conversation between the two

i am making it all a worship trick - no 60 in the very sporadic series 4!

shine

advent sunday today...

if you want a tune for it the one on my mind is shine by soulsavers

and how about breathe myself a meaning by martin daws for a spoken word piece

and a liturgy/prayers from christine sine

and a photo from me

 

birmingham trinity and we will cross the road

at the recent new parish conference in birmingham, lou davis was painting throughout and created this birmingham trinity, an improvisation on rublev of course and she says this about it...

The icon is said to represent the Trinity, the three angels being those who visited Abraham. As I walked round Birmingham, I had a sense of being a guest there, at one moment isolated, then next welcomed by the city. I felt as Abraham did, being invited to take a place at the fourth side of the table and commune with God in that context, a welcome wariness. There are bits and pieces of Birmingham in the picture, probably some actual dirt from the streets – as we took texture rubbings from the pavements and walls, and in the repeating patterns. You may recognise the circles as the pattern on the Selfridges building which dominates that part of the city, reflected everywhere in windows and street furniture. Then just round the corner is a bit that’s frightening at night – as overheard by one of our artists.

I kept to a palette of greys, with the occasional point of bright colour, as we had observed in the city itself. It’s deliberately half realist, half abstract, because that’s a style I’ve been reaching for as an artist, it’s something I appreciate in others work and want to reproduce myself. The realism gives you a hook to understand it and the abstraction sets you free. I want to create a balance between the two.

i love that...

at the same conference tim watson wrote some liturgy and poetry on the theme of new parish neighbourhood which you can download here - if you look online realise it is two pages. the first is a poem and the second a call and response liturgy called nobody crosses the road.

i am making these a worship trick - remember those?!

lighting beacons - worship trick and it's free...

lighting beacons is a set of daily prayers and liturgy - short simple creative. you can download a pdf of it free from proost - yes that's right it's free. or you can visit this web site online and click on the day and time you are on and read there. i have just downloaded it myself and am yet to give it a whirl (that is if you can whirl liturgy?!). 

thank you tim watson (who is becoming one of the most prolific emerging liturgists i think…), dot woods and josh walker for this gift.

if you want a physical copy you can order a paperback at cost price here.

so this is a worship trick - 59 in series 4 i think….

worship for an outward facing church

today i am heading to church house to be one of the presenters at an annual gathering organised by the liturgical commission of the church of england for those involved in creating and leading worship in dioceses round the country. i am looking forward to it and doing a double act with nicholas henshall around the theme of worship for an outward facing church. we have decided to pitch the day as much as possible as a conversation around questions and themes that we have been reflecting on. these are the questions people will be discussing - let me know your thoughts if you want to join in. i don't know if there's a hashtag for the day but perhaps if you want to send a thought i'll check twitter on #worshipforanoutwardfacingchurch 

• What is the relationship between worship and mission?
• How do you negotiate the gifts of tradition in a particular cultural and/or local and/or missional context?
• If we loosen up the rubrics around worship what happens to Anglican identity? 
• How do we encourage creativity and experimentation in liturgy?
• Might participation in the creative production of worship be a way to encourage discipleship? If so, how do we move away from a culture of provider/client expert/ignorant in worship?
• What would happen if the assumed culture of the church around leading liturgy was based on trust of leaders rather than fear/control (of the liturgical thought police) ? Put another way what are we afraid of?
• In practice what might a centred set rather than a bounded set approach look like? 
• If canon law is changed through practice and experimentation how can we encourage a shift of emphasis towards permission giving?
• Which presents the greater challenge in terms of worship and mission - the rubrics of the church or the culture of the church?
• What training of worship leaders, liturgists, presidents… etc might be required to enable worship that is in and out of the tradition but able to improvise creatively?
• How might the notion of mixed economy be applied to worship and mission?
• Has cut and paste technology changed everything anyway?

we've got poets! worship trick time (first in ages)

i have been reading soil and soul by alastair mcintosh. it's amazing. it's the story of how he and others set up the isle of eigg trust and managed against the odds to help the residents of the isle of eigg to clear their laid from the estate. it's a reminder that you don't have to settle for the way things are and in relation to money and power this is so important. it's a also an incredibly spiritual book - on the relationship to land, community life. he is inspired by walter wink's trilogy on the powers which suggests that in the face of any domination system a process of liberation involves naming the powers, unmasking the powers and engaging the powers. 

i have been thinking particularly about the internalised scripts and messages people tell themselves that end up imprisoning the imagination. if we are to be free this internal stuff has to shift - we have to learn to believe a different script, a different story. i have been reminded of this through lent as ian adams daily prayer series temptations in morning bell (see here for photos of all the scripts) has been a simple taunt/script that is precisely this kind of thing. it's a wonderful series and it got me thinking what my own taunts or scripts are that stop me from being free. certainly the islanders are not initially free in their own minds and a big part of the liberation is enabling them to begin to believe a different narrative about themselves and their relationship to the laird and the island. once that happens victory seems inevitable. 

my favourite paragraph in the book that produced a massive grin on my face was where alastair is reflecting on how ridiculous the situation is - the trust has no resources and the odds are stacked against it. the laird has power, money, control, friends in high places and so on. but there is this great moment where macintosh says with utmost sincerity 'but we do run on poetry'!!! i loved that. the community bards have been the story tellers at the heart of life on the islands so it's with a good basis. but this struck me as wonderful and so like the nature of the kingdom of god and indeed at this moment so like the easter story. 

so… last night we had a meal with friends from grace in our kitchen remembering the last supper jesus had with his friends. that was a meal about liberation from a domination system - a passover meal - remembering the slaves exodus from pharaoh's tyranny. jesus of course reframes it for his own life and death opening up liberation. well after discussing ian adams taunts and what we might need freeing from we proceeded to write a liturgy to share with bread and wine round the meal. it was simple - start a line with 'we've got…' and add something and then one with 'you've got…' and add something. what we came up with is below and of course it is called 'we've got poets'. and i think it's worthy of being a worship trick - 57 in series 4. try adding your own lines!

you've got the answers
we've got poets

you've got tunnel vision
we've got a wide horizon

you've got control of the media
we've got a pen

you've got cities of cement
we've got music

you've got the power to make people afraid, to keep them contained and compliant
we've got a different story, a creative resistance, relationships that sustain and nourish us

you've got management
we've got compassion

you've got viciousness and aggressiveness to scare
we've got meaningful relationships that heal and lift us

you' make people rely on handouts
we've got allotments

you've got surveillance
we've got openness

you've got appetite
we've got creativity

you've got the present
we've got future hope

you've got isolation
we've got mail

you've got iphones
we've got iphones

you've got destructiveness
we've got the power to rebuild with gratitude

you've got lawyers, superinjunctions, court costs that bankrupt the innocent
we've got citizens advice bureaux, amnesty international, pro bono solicitors working into the night

you've got shoulder pads and hello magazine
we've got a real example of a selfless life

you've got control of several churches
we've got a small group

you've got a porn empire
we've got our bodies

you've got the time and date
we've got a relaxed attitude to the whole thing

you've got the reactionary press hooting and braying at anyone different fighting on behalf of the powerful
we've got underground whispers, blogs run on love and creativity, networks of people who want a better world

you've got machinery
we've got mustard seeds

you've got tradition, the way things have always been done, the status quo
we've got a different story, anew way of doing things, a vision of how things can be better, more equal, more free

you've got no idea about anyone else
we've got each other

you've got Whole Foods™  
we've got bread and wine

you've got death
we've got resurrection

this hasn't been crafted - just a spontaneous piece of liturgy... we were set off on what i think was quite an interesting thought by the line about iPhones and thought an equally interesting liturgy would be to have both things the same all the way through. you've got a story we've got a story etc but maybe that's for another time...

fear and dust, and very nearly a whisper: new resources on proost

i always love seeing what people are creating in worship that is soulful and heartfelt and from the bottom up. proost has always tried to give voice to artists and communities in this way. i personally have always favoured liturgy and ideas that come this way round rather than being created for general use (though that has its place too). so i am pleased to say that there are two new resources on proost both of which capture this feel and approach

fear and dust is a book of poems, prayers and hymns to a wild creator god from tim watson who has a couple of other books on proost. as you know if you know proost we love poets! the good news is it's volume 1 so there will be more to follow… it's available as a pdf.

very nearly a whisper is an album of ambient music from dennis hendricksen who i met on a visit to canada. he is new on proost and there is a sample track on the page if you want to have a listen.

you can of course subscribe to proost for a year which means you can access any of the content when you like, including lots of resources for easter for example.