We are creatures of habit.
Of routine.
We are all in our own groove.
So try new. Try different. Try crazy.
Try unexpected.
Like punk? Try opera.
Wear black? Try white.
Love bubbles? Try still.
Speak Spanish? Learn Chinese.
Love to ride? Try running.
Always grumpy? Try happy.
Like science fiction? Try romance.
Never cook? Bake some bread.
Forever cynical? Try love. Try Trust. Try hope.
Take a different route to work.
Say yes when you mean no.
Wear your watch on the other hand.
Leave the comfort zone.
Thursday, June 30, 2011
Tuesday, June 28, 2011
We have two fantastic opportunities
Youth Bus Project Leader
Very exciting opportunity for a passionate youth worker to expand and lead our Double Decker youth bus outreach. Taking youth work to new areas of Bradford that has none or little provision. Working with, and empowering communities to be effective at meeting young people at their point of need and transforming their community.Salary 19k
Sports and Community Worker
Do you love sport and love working with young people? We have an opportunity for someone to use their passions to impact hundreds of local young people in schools and community settings. Be a part of a fantastic team with loads of exciting opportunities.
£12-18k depending on qualifications and experience
Closing date: 22nd July 2011
e:merge is a Community Interest Company operating in Bradford, West Yorkshire.
We work with young people between the ages of 11-19 through general youth work activities, training & employment programmes, sport development and a youth congregation.
Presently we have the following job available.
If after considering this post and looking at our website you are still interested in working with us, then please do make contact with us.
For full job descriptions, application forms and more information then call or e-mail Bailey Warner on 01274 660244, baileyw@emergeonline.org.uk.
Visit our web-site at www.emergeonline.org.uk
Tim Elgar CEO
18 Pawson St
Bradford
BD4 8BY
Email: tim@emergeonline.org.uk
www.emergeonline.org.uk
Monday, June 27, 2011
I hear
I feel
I think
I fumble
I reflect
I spin
I wonder
I expand
I wander
I cringe
I bow
I yearn
I crumble
I reboot
I deepen
I pray
I journey
I learn
I spiritualise
I stumble
I touch
I collide
I scribble
I re-start
I always scribble in Church.
My interior is journeying
alongside the service
alongside the people
alongside the Divine.
I want to welcome all experiences.
To the heart
To the centre
to the soul
of me
and then offer them all up
NOT just the ones coming at me
but also
the ones internal
the ones eternal.
There are power messages everywhere.
Just like new feelings
every mili-second
which we often don't collide with
unless they hurt .....
There is lightening in the air
wireless power
earthed power
and we are in the earthing.
I fail to tune in
most of the time.
Too busy
too reactive
surfing life.
I have not loved you
with my whole heart
I have not presented
my life as
a living sacrifice
yet I want to
committed
I believe in
it.
pipwilson.com
Saturday, June 25, 2011
Christian Aid's Digital Team
I am always clicking about the need to BELONG. I need to BELONG. I believe we all do. MASLOW says it is needed for development/towards wholeness/and don't we ALL want that? You can belong to Greenbelt/ hold hands with others/ become a volunteer = being not just a TAKER but becoming ....... A MAKER. Consider holding hands with me on this journey/ and other hands intertwine with us .......... it is something special to BELONG ......... click GREENBELT ANGELS on the GB website ......and VOLUNTEERS
Here's Andy Jackson, Christian Aid’s Digital Content Editor (and Café Manager at Greenbelt), to fill us in on the work of the organisation’s digital team… — Today is an appropriate day to be writing this. This morning, The Guardian wrote about David Cameron facing a revolt from Conservative MEPs over the UK coalition's environmental policies. [...]
Ticket Deadline Countdown – 6 days to go
..... HOPE HOPE to see you there ............
Young people might have their own venue onsite, but some stuff is too big to squeeze into the Shed, so at lunchtime each day the Big Top transforms into Shedloads - the Shed's Big Brother, serving up a slice of jaw-dropping, eye popping, foot-tapping goodness.
Saturday: the Shedloads Spoken Word Showcase
With a stellar lineup of some of the globe's finest wordsmiths, hosted by European Slam Poetry champ Harry Baker, and featuring Dizraeli (from Dizraeli and the Small Gods), freestyle from impresario Soweto Kinch, award-winning MC Jack Flash (from Extra Curricular), and performance poets William Stopha (Hope for Robots) and El Gruer
Sunday: The Shedloads Music Showcase
Featuring great British-born hip hop and electro-beat music with Manchester's finest LZ7 and girl band Golddigger
Monday: The Shedloads Dance Showcase
Featuring amazing streetdance from Britain's Got Talent semi-finalists, Flava and the wonderful Caja, all the way from Guatemala
Don't forget, 30th June is your last opportunity to buy tickets for Greenbelt 2011 at a reduced rate. You can buy your tickets from the Greenbelt Box Office. To help convince the undecided we're posting a series of announcements as we approach the ticket deadline, you can read them all here.
Friday, June 24, 2011
Ticket Deadline Countdown – 7 days to go
Ever keen to engage with the stories that dominate our headlines we are pleased to announce two brilliant journalists for this year's festival.
We're very excited that we shall be joined by David Loyn, the BBC Foreign Correspondent who has been reporting from disasters and conflicts for more than thirty years. He will be asking whether social media and other technology have muscled out traditional reporting, in a post-Arab Spring world.
We're also thrilled to announce that Channel 4 News' Economics Editor, Faisal Islam will be speaking at this year's festival and taking part in a panel alongside economists Gillian Tett and Matthew Bishop and Christian Aid's CEO Loretta Minghella, who formerly worked at the FSA. Faisal has been working at Channel 4 News since 2004, and collected numerous awards for his coverage of the Icelandic banking crisis in 2009.
Don't forget, 30th June is your last opportunity to buy tickets for Greenbelt 2011 at a reduced rate. You can buy your tickets from the Greenbelt Box Office. To help convince the undecided we're posting a series of announcements as we approach the ticket deadline, you can read them all here.
Playworker, YMCA London South West
Active Living Co-ordinator, Reigate & Redhill YMCA
Current vacancies, Sussex Central YMCA
Current vacancies, Guildford YMCA (Plantation)
Chief Executive Officer, Reading YMCA, £49k pa
All current job vacancies
Mental health care for youth offenders 'lacking'
Mental health care for youth offenders 'lacking'
By Nick Triggle Health correspondent, BBC News“Start Quote
We are currently failing many of these children and young people”
*
Crafting A Thin Place: Karla Yaconelli
I feel I belong to wildgoosefestival
My spiritual home has give it birth/I wish I was there right now/ bBlessed
There is a Celtic saying that “heaven and earth are only three feet apart, but in the thin places that distance is even smaller.” A “thin place” is where, for a brief time, the separation between heaven and earth dissolves and we are able to glimpse the existence of a world that is beyond what we know through our five senses. A “thin place” is exactly where my late husband and I found ourselves the very first time we experienced the Greenbelt Festival in England … and each the many times we returned. From the outset, we longed (as did others) for a similar festival in the United States. Over the last 20-odd years, many of us tried to make it happen, but for lots of complex reasons, it just didn’t … until now.
I’m positively euphoric about the Wild Goose Festival because …
- … I am tired. I am tired of political and theological polarization; of fear and anger and hatred; of “us” and “them;” of having the same conversations over and over but getting nowhere; of people being marginalized (or worse, condemned) simply for being who they truly are or saying what they truly think; of rigidity and dogma and people’s seeming unwillingness to change or sincerely consider another point of view. And I am tired of the impact all this “infighting” has on the weakest among us: the oppressed, exploited, suffering and broken brothers and sisters of our world.
- … I am filled with hope. As part of the team that is helping put this festival together, I am walking with people who challenge and inspire me; people who embrace spirited but respectful debate and differences of opinion about all aspects of life; people who work tirelessly on behalf of the subjugated and the poor; people who live and share the gospel of Grace and will be satisfied with nothing short of the Kingdom of God being manifest on earth, as it is in heaven; people who seek justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with God; people who yearn to create a place of belonging – a place where, despite our differences – we are safe, God’s grace is palpable, and the wind of the Wild Goose blows freely among us; people who help me believe that we really can find a way to heal our fractured world.
- … I love beauty. The arts are not only beautiful, they communicate the truth of God in ways that nothing else can and they help us find common ground in uncommon places.
- … I believe change truly can – and does – happen. I believe crazy, magical, mysterious, miraculous, phenomenal, holy stuff happens in the thin places when, for a few shining moments, the veil between this world and the next parts … and we can sense that heaven on earth might actually be possible.
Wednesday, June 22, 2011
Faith Through A Lens
If you have an eye for an image, and a heart for spiritual matters, take a look at the Faith Through A Lens competition… They're looking to find "the amateur photographer that best captures the essence of faith and the community". Prizes include up to £1000 worth of audio-visual or photographic equipment for your chosen [...]
Gilles Peterson WOW
my sort of music
entering heaven
With An All-Vinyl
Brownswood Basement Special!
Synopsis
It's vinyl all the way as Gilles heads into the basement and digs out some classics, with a Eugene McDaniels showcase, as well as dropping some delights from Anita Ward, Gill Scott Heron and Nina Simone!
Plus, Gilles drops some tropical treats from the Caribbean and some protest songs from the 1970s! Some fantastic rediscovered nuggets so be sure to check it!
Music (only some listed here) played
-
George Melvin Quartet — Intro (From The Album, Live From GT Brooks Ribs & More)
NR -
Dollar Brand Trio With Kippie Moketsi — Bra Joe From Kilanjaro (From The album, Dollar Brand + 3)
Soultown -
Nina Simone — Vous Etes Seuls, Mais Je Desire Etre Avec Vous (From the Album, Fodder On My Wings)
Carrere -
Konstantin Petrosyan — Track 1 (From The Album, Concerto For Voice And Orchestra)
Unknown -
Muzik Fiendz — Track 1 (From The Album,The Second Adventure of Boomski & Clutch)
Listen Vision -
Marvin Holmes & Justice — Kwame (From The Album, Honor Thy Father)
Konkord Records -
Jaco Pastorius — Portrait of Tracy (From The Album, Jaco Pastorius)
Epic -
Kuusumun Profeetta — Kovin Lentaen Kotiin Kaipaan (From The Album, Jazzflora)
DNM – Dealers of Nordic Music -
Traore Amadou dit Ballake — Renouveau
Disques CVD -
Ahouangnimon Sebastien Pynasco — Mi Hlin Migan
Voix Africane -
Janet Kay — Silly Games (From The Album, Capricorn Woman)
Warner -
Anita Ward — Ring My Bell
TK Disco -
Evans Pyramid – Never Gonna Leave You (From The Album, Americana: Rock Your Soul — Blue Eyed Soul)
BBE -
Frankie Gee — Date With The Rain
Claridge Records -
Touch of Class — I Just Can’t Say Goodbye (From The Album, I’m In Heaven)
Midland International -
Lou Bond — Why Must Our Eyes Always Be Turned Be Turned Backwards (From The Album, Lou Bond)
We Produce -
Gil Scott-Heron — H20 Gate Blues (From The Album, Winter In America)
Strata
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
A PAINTING JOB
Painting the Church
There was a Scottish painter named Smokey Macgregor who was very interested in making a penny where he could, so he often thinned down his paint to make it go a wee bit further.
As it happened, he got away with this for some time, but eventually the Baptist Church decided to do a big restoration job on the outside of one of their biggest buildings..
Smokey put in a bid, and, because his price was so low, he got the job.
So he set about erecting the scaffolding and setting up the planks, and buying the paint and, yes, I am sorry to say, thinning it down with turpentine..
Well, Smokey was up on the scaffolding, painting away, the job nearly completed, when suddenly there was a horrendous clap of thunder, the sky opened, and the rain poured down washing the thinned paint from all over the church and knocking Smokey clear off the scaffold to land on the lawn among the gravestones, surrounded by telltale puddles of the thinned and useless paint.
Smokey was no fool. He knew this was a judgment from the Almighty,
so he got down on his knees and cried:
"Oh, God, Oh God, forgive me; what should I do?"
And from the thunder, a mighty voice spoke..
(you're going to love this)
"Repaint! Repaint!
And thin no more
Monday, June 20, 2011
Brian Haw
Initially Haw, a former carpenter who began his vigil in June 2001, was protesting about the economic sanctions imposed by the West on Iraq, which, he claimed, were responsible for the deaths of 200 Iraqi children per day. For months he sat on a chair, fasting and praying. Not only were his prayers fruitless, but in the meantime Britain and America invaded first Afghanistan, then Iraq.
Initially Haw was regarded as something between harmless eccentric and damn nuisance, but as public opposition to the war in Iraq grew and as the authorities embarked on attempts to silence him, he acquired the status of a folk hero, symbol of protest and thorn in the side of an unpopular government. In 2006 he was voted the most inspiring political figure at the Channel 4 political awards.
Brian William Haw was born a twin, by 25 minutes, on January 7 1949, the eldest of five children. The family lived for a while in Barking, Essex, and then moved to Whitstable in Kent. They were involved in an evangelical church; Brian found his faith aged 11 at Sunshine Corner on the shingle beach next to the Oyster Company.
His father had been a sniper in the Reconnaissance Corps during the war and was among the first to enter Bergen-Belsen after its liberation. Afterwards, he worked in a betting office. Twenty years after seeing Bergen-Belsen, he gassed himself in the kitchen at the back of the church. Brian was 13.
Apprenticed to a boatbuilder at 16, he joined the Merchant Navy, sending home £4 a week. He worked as a deckhand and eventually received his certificate to steer 27,000-ton ships. He passed through the Suez Canal, climbed the Pyramids and toured the ports of the Middle East and India. He returned from one voyage to do six months at a college of evangelism in Nottingham, after which he decided to embark on a freelance mission to bring peace to the world.
Northern Ireland during the Troubles was his first port of call. At Christmas 1970 he took himself and his guitar to Belfast, singing carols in the streets round the Shanklin and Falls Roads and handing out white peace balloons in Republican pubs.
Having, by some miracle, survived this adventure, he moved to Essex where he started a removals business, also working part-time as a carpenter. He married Kay, the girl across the road and they later settled on an estate in Redditch, Worcestershire.
But family commitments did not dampen Haw’s missionary zeal and in 1989, powerfully affected by the films of John Pilger, he set off for the killing fields of Cambodia. He stayed there for three months, but when he returned he found that people did not want to hear about it: “My church gave me 10 minutes in a midweek prayer meeting to talk about genocide,” he recalled.
Sunday, June 19, 2011
If we pretend we are OK Don't share vulnerabilities Humans will only relate to what they see, your mask. The real inner you, who is nurtured by relationships, is starved. No-one is relating to the real you.
Saturday, June 18, 2011
Why I'm Excited: Eska
Tags: eska, greenbelt festival 2011, lineup, performance cafe,
In a continuing series on the blog, we're going to be hearing about parts of the Lineup for 2011 that people are particularly looking forward to. (For all Why I'm Excited posts, click here.) If there's something on the Greenbelt 2011 programme that you're particularly looking forward to, do email us a paragraph or two saying why, and we'll put [...]
Wednesday, June 15, 2011
Here's to the babies in a brand new world
Here's to the beauty of the stars
Here's to the travellers on the open road
Here's to the dreamers in the bars
Here's to the teachers in the crowded rooms
Here's to the workers in the fields
Here's to the preachers of the sacred words
Here's to the drivers at the wheel
Here's to you my little loves with blessings from above
Now let the day begin
Here's to you my little loves with blessings from above
Now let the day begin, let the day begin
Here's to the winners of the human race
Here's to the losers in the game
Here's to the soldiers of the bitter war
Here's to the wall that bears their names
Here's to you my little loves with blessings from above
Now let the day begin
Here's to you my little loves with blessings from above
Let the day begin, let the day begin, let the day start
Here's to the doctors and their healing work
Here's to the loved ones in their care
Here's to the strangers on the streets tonight
Here's to the lonely everywhere
Here's to the wisdom from the mouths of babes
Here's to the lions in the cage
Here's to the struggles of the silent war
Here's to the closing of the age.
Here's to you my little loves with blessings from above
Now let the day begin
Here's to you my little loves with blessings from above
Let the day begin
Here's to you my little loves with blessings from above
Let the day begin
Here's to you my little loves with blessings from above
Now let the day begin, let the day begin, let the day start
Solas Festival 2011 – Lineup
Solas Festival was launched last year as a sister festival for Greenbelt in Scotland. Supported by us, and with good Greenbelty people involved, we're thrilled that Solas 2011 sounds just as exciting as the first, as they announce this year's lineup. Taking place over the weekend of 25th and 26th June in Wiston, Scotland, the [...]
Tuesday, June 14, 2011
This is real.
A story.
A true story.
A story from South Africa
about a mother at the
Truth and Reconciliation Commission
hearing about her son's murder.
The police officer who had ordered the brutal killing was there,
shamefacedly listening to the details of what he and his colleagues had done.
At the end the room was quiet.
The chair of the commission,
Archbishop Desmond Tutu,
asked the woman
if she had anything to say
to the man who had killed her son.
She responded:
"I am very full of sorrow.
So I am asking you now -
come with me to the place where he died,
pick up in your hands some of the dust
of the place where his body lay,
and feel in your soul what it is to have lost so much.
And then I will ask you one thing more.
When you have felt my sadness,
I want you to do this.
I have so much love,
and without my son,
that love has nowhere to go.
So I am asking you -
from now on,
you be my son,
and I will love you in his place."
And the policeman did become as her son.’
I am weeping now
............ most powerful ....
I weep too
for you ........
So this was my beautiful moment of conversion.'
Anne Lamott:
Travelling Mercies - Some Thoughts On Faith
Monday, June 13, 2011
Sunday, June 12, 2011
Friday, June 10, 2011
Kanye West paid his respect to Gil Scott-Heron by performing at the singer and poet’s memorial service on Thursday.
West closed the service with his song
“Lost in the World” which sample’s Scott-Heron’s track “Who Will Survive in America”.
The service was held at the legendary Riverside Church in Harlem, NY with Scott-Heron’s daughter Gia, performing Bette Midler’s “The Rose” and Stevie Wonder listed as an honorary pallbearer in the program, according to The New York Daily News.
Scott-Heron, 62, died last Friday and was most known for his song “The Reveloution Will Not Be Televised” which was sampled by West on his Billboard 200 #1 debut, My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy.
Kanye recenty hit the stage with Kid Cudi and Big Sean at the launch of the Heineken Red Star Access tour in New York performing the hit “Power”.
Thursday, June 09, 2011
I am a group worker.
My chosen work - I yearn to do this ....
.... it is group work.
I love it
I struggle with it
struggle in it
but boy oh boy
I see beauty ...............
Few of us are not part of a Team
or Group and
I am counting 'family'
as our primary group.
We often learn most
by soaking information in like a sponge.
Not just head knowledge.
We are
educated
as a member of a group.
Worship
Play
Work
Family
We often learn most by soaking information in like a sponge.
Our quality of life depends on the groups and teams which we belong to.
How we relate to these teams depends on our personal skills
and our stated, or un-stated, and lived-out personal mission.
(See my Mission Statement)
We all have a style of how we relate to other humans
and we don't have to retain the one we practice at the moment.
When I conduct training courses I often use an 'experiential style'.
1 We learn best, it seems to me, when we are personally involved.
2 If knowledge is discovered by our own experiences - it then is more able to be applied to living life.
3 Commitment is highest when we set our own objectives/goals/targets.
4 A good course gives reflective time before departure to;
- reflect on the experience, the concepts and ideas raised in the experience and
- concrete naming of the steps which the individual has decided to take.
Change change change
I am in that at the moment
I am always at it
but
I am noticing it a lot this week.
How do you change?
Are you
prepared?
Willing?
Able?
In my life I have come to this place
of how humans change::
1. Slow despair, boredom.
2. They hurt sufficiently.
3 The sudden discovery that they can.