Blue sky

One of the questions we have been asking ourselves as part of the vision team is this.
'If you were to start church from scratch how would it look.'

I know this may seem theoretical, and of course we need to be practical, but I want us to have at least tried to think how we might be, rather than just trying to fix what we have.

I wonder how you would answer the question?

Coralie Grace Davids

We are desperately sad at the news of Anthony and Peachy's tragedy.

Thank you to all of you who have promised to pray throughout the day.

Even if you can only pray for them for a few minutes at your given time we want the Davids to know they are surrounded by our prayers. Please set a reminder. If you are not on the list email me and I will allocate you a time.

6am Claire Pearson
7am Liz Tissing
7.30am Pete Burnham
8am Gemma Gent
8.30am Tom Crease
9am Ruth Crease
10am B Arnold
11am Sarah Perrin
11.30am Stavroulla Andreou
12pm Sarah Wall
1pm Ellie Welsh
1.30pm Jayne Welburn
2pm Jo Arkell
2.30pm Angela Fletcher
3pm Jane Love
4pm Amy Winger
5pm Danny and Kirsty Allen
6pm Sophia Hanvey
6.30pm Willow Kail
7pm Claire Dean
8pm Vicky Mirfin
8.30pm Sonya & Nick Sireau
9pm Alex Goldfinch
9.30pm Michele and Terence Berry
10pm James Mortley
10.30pm Sarah Hulcoop
11pm Mark Fletcher
12am Dan & Summer Passerelli
1am Elizabeth Cameron

Vision

As you may be aware we are in the process of reworking the vision and direction of our Evening Service at the moment, and we would value your prayers. As part of that we would be interested in your responses to a couple of questions...

If our goal is making and maturing disciples, are we right in thinking that we tend to put much more emphasis on maturing than making? Is that important?

How appropriate is it for a church to focus its energy and attention on reaching a particular section of our community (eg in our case young, professional, educated)?

What is your Theological worldview?

Had lots of conversations about this Theological worldview quiz recently, so I thought I would post it on this blog too. It isn't too serious, and neither is it flawless, but it is interesting and a good discussion starter. Take it here, and post your results in the comments below.

If you are not aware of Kurt Vonnegut you should be. His article in the Guardian last saturday was fantastic writing. Speaking of the hypocrisy in American politics he writes:
For some reason, the most vocal Christians among us never mention the Beatitudes. But, often with tears in their eyes, they demand that the Ten Commandments be posted in public buildings. And of course that's Moses, not Jesus. I haven't heard one of them demand that the Sermon on the Mount, the Beatitudes, be posted anywhere.
"Blessed are the merciful" in a courtroom? "Blessed are the peacemakers" in the Pentagon? Give me a break!
Enjoy the article.

COTC from Space

One of the coolest free apps around was until recently only available for windows, but Google earth is now being developed for Mac (hooray!). It is not officially releaced but the Beta version got leaked, and you can pick it up here. They seem to be improving the resolution and you can now see COTC clearly from space.

Chaos Theology: Fear

I really enjoyed this piece written by Jo, which ellie performed in response to the question What do I fear?

I’ve reached the conclusion that what I fear most is constantly chasing down the many things in life which seem to be in perpetual motion – my career for one. What if I never get where I want to be? What if I’m just not good enough? When is my boss going to see through the act and realise I don’t actually know what I’m doing? My career has a life of its own, running away from me like a load of marbles dropped on the floor. I chase them but there are always more to be retrieved, and the more I get hold of, the more there are to chase. I’m afraid that the only way to stop the game is to let go of all the glass balls – just let them roll away. But what then? What would I do with myself then?

You can read the whole piece here.

'Narnia represents everything that is most hateful about religion'

Perhaps you have read Polly Toynbee's passionate article on the new Narnia film. Well worth a read. It is not one of her more measured responses, and all the more interesting for that.

Every one of those thorns, the nuns used to tell my mother, is hammered into Jesus's holy head every day that you don't eat your greens or say your prayers.

The article gives some real insight into Polly Toynbee's real issues with abusive religion, which we want to be hugely sympathetic to.

The two dons may have shared the same love of unquestioning feudal power, with worlds of obedient plebs and inferior folk eager to bend at the knee to any passing superior white persons - even children; both their fantasy worlds and their Christianity assumes that rigid hierarchy of power - lord of lords, king of kings, prince of peace to be worshipped and adored.

But essentially this is a power struggle between conservatism and liberalism, and christianity is caught up in it. I don't think we want the agenda of Jesus associated with that power struggle, and in order to do that any conversation will have to be humble about the failings of the church in the past and its throwing its substantial weigh behind political and social conservatism. However the crucial issue is this:

So Lewis weaves his dreams to invade children's minds with Christian iconography that is part fairytale wonder and joy - but heavily laden with guilt, blame, sacrifice and a suffering that is dark with emotional sadism.

Interwoven with that struggle however is a philosophical debate. Scientific humanism will allow no limits to be placed on human power and potential. Here we need to disagree. Pollys humanism is her weakness - her privilege and education, social standing and personal stature make her naive about the reality of human experience. We are guilty, we do suffer - the answer is not education (though that is a profound good) we do need redemption - but trying to help Polly to see that is a massive task, particularly given her experiences.

Chaos theology: Love

Notes from last nights final sermon in the Chaos Theology series are available here.

Quake Gig

Last night we hosted one of a series of Quake Gigs in aid of the victims of the South east Asia earthquake. It was an amazing night, with a wonderful mix of homegrown talent and special guests. Enjoy these video clips.

More photo's and video to follow (email me pictures if you have them), but thank you to all the artists, and to all of you who came and enjoyed and gave generously.

Chaos Theology: environment

The fundamental challenge of any serious appreciation of the environmental crisis facing our generation is that we cannot hope to sustain the lifestyle we cling to, while denying it to others on the planet.
Perhaps for us the least comfortable aspect of Jesus call to kingdom living is the commitment to simplicity.
Is there life after materialism? Is their a better way?

Chaos Theology: Spirituality

Imagine life was a Waterstone's bookshop...
Spirituality is a huge growth industry in our Culture, yet christians are unwilling, or afraid to engage. This sermon was intended to help us understand and connect with the secular spirituality of our age. I am not so sure how well the sermon recording thing is going, so someone suggested a summary of the sermon, based on my notes. Is this a better plan? If there areprevious Chaos Theology sermons that notes would be useful for I can provide those too.

Paul - A new play by Howard Brenton

"Taking the remarkable life and moral teachings of this profound religious thinker, Howard Brenton explores the extraordinary phenomenon of faith. While offering a secular reading of the story of Christ’s resurrection, at the play’s heart Paul preaches from his Letter to the Corinthians, the eloquence of which cannot fail to move."

The Creative communications homegroup went to see the play last week, and they found it somewhat provocative. Stavs has recounted one of the pivotal moments which you can read here. What do you think?

Only 5,028,672 seconds till Christmas!

It is late october - so it must be time for the Christmas lights on Oxford street to go up! Count down the seconds to Christmas with this site!
Anyway - we want your creative ideas for Christmas this year. Here is what we have already...
1) Carol concerts - Two again? 11th and the 18th are planned.
2) Christmas Film nights. I have two great films in mind - Tim Burtons 'a nightmare before Christmas' and Frank Capra's 'Its a wonderful life'.
3) Little ark Christmas service - morning of the 11th.
4) Carols in the N1 Centre 10th December 12pm - we need to provide musicians and PA.
What other ideas do you have?

COTC Global

I was tracking where people visit the COTC blog from, and I was amazed to see lots from North American, and even one from South America. Click on the picture above to see the last 50 visits. You are all very welcome, it is amazing to have so many international guests, but who are you all? Say hello - introduce yourselves!

New forms of Church

I had to do a presentation at the Bishops Council last night [spaced out with jet lag!] on new ways of being church, and I included a video intended to give a flavour of COTC. It is a bit thrown together, but the oldies at the Council loved it, and were very excited about us. Thought you might like to see it [Quicktime 5mb]

Congratulations Roseanne & Stuart

I am waiting for my delayed flight in Ronaldsway airport, on the way back from Roseanne and Stuarts wedding. The one consolation is free wifi so here are a few photos from the wedding of the new Mr & Mrs Mclean. Congratulations you two!

Pub church Brighton

An old friend of mine from vicar factory has been appointed to a new job in Brighton, and is being supported by the diocese to plant a new type of church in the city centre. They are meeting in a pub, and have a focus on the sort of people who would not normally go to church (sound familar?) They have a website here: Christ Church Brighton . Please pray for them - I am sure these first months will be hard but exciting.

Chaos Theology: Power

"The world itself is the will to power - and nothing else! And you yourself are the will to power - and nothing else!"
Friedrich Nietzsche.
A right theology of power understood through the Bible narrative and exercised in our real lives is the intention of this sermon. We all have mechanisms for dealing with the use and abuse of power, but I suspect that we don't always recognise them or express them coherently. Power, whether at work on the global scale or in our own relationships needs to be understood and used for good not evil. And Jesus astonishing relationship with his own power is a unique point of engagement with a world obsessed with power. This fourth talk in our chaos theology series can be found here. If you have comments or thoughts add them below.

An A to Z of Alternative Worship

This is a lovely piece of work on aspects of creative worship, even if it starts a bit cheesily. A is for Ambience, good. B is for Beanbags... hmmm.
Bible, bravery or brokenness would be my immediate suggestions. I like K is for kleptomania and G is for Graceful particularly.

Chaos Theology : Wealth

What are you worth? What is it that makes us rich? We are treading on dangerous ground when we raise questions about wealth and money, and a working theology of wealth is not going to be easy. But it is the subject that Jesus talks about more than any other than the kingdom of God itself, and our christianity is shallow if it doesn't effect our attitude to wealth.
The sermon in our series can be downloaded here. Comments and questions below!

Billboard Jesus

You might have spotted on the BBC website the new christmas poster campaign by the Churches Advertising Network continuing the revolutionary theme from the che guevara poster. There is a Q&A about it here. What do you think? Not your conventional christmas image. I am kinda liking it.

Meaning

The second sermon on our Chaos theology series, on the theme of meaning from last night can be found here

beingyourself.info

Jeremy just sent me the link to his new work site at beingyourself.info which is a fantastic looking mission project based on Psalm 139, and the toolbox page which explains how to use it. SGM (Scripture Gift mission) is apparently going through the process of reimagining its identity and methods to better serve the gospel in an information age. Exciting stuff.

Getting out there

'Start with Church and the mission will probably get lost. Start with mission and it is likely that the church will be found'

Mission shaped Church 2004

The subtext to our attempts to do real world theology this term is the conviction that we are to be an urban church, engaged with the lives and ideas that form our city. John Stott said many years ago that the work of proclaiming the Gospel required dual listening; listening to God, and listening to Culture. We intend to prioritise that this term and beyond.

One of the ways that will happen is through homegroups, where we are combining a series on the early church discovering its mission, with some recommended reading.

Below are links to some of the books we are suggesting. Have a flick through and choose one that appeals. If you have already read one of these perhaps try something else. Any other suggestions of good books?

Out of the Saltshaker A thoughtful and at the time groundbreaking approach to relational evangelism. The Shaping of things to come; fascinating and sometime uncomfortable work on church and mission. Emerging Evangelism John Finney's excellent book on theory and practice for 21st Century mission. Know and tell the Gospel. Australian John Chapman on good form with a clear and simple approach to telling the Gospel

Identity

The opening sermon of our Chaos Theology series is now online. The theme is identity. You can find the Beauty in the Breakdown video here and the sermon audio is here.[Sorry about the quality - working on that]

Chaos Theology

I am excited and a little nervous about our teaching programme for this Autumn. We are thinking about big issues. The principle behind it we introduced at the end of last term, that the next step for Church on the Corner is to step outward and to engage with the culture that we are part of. And to do that we need not only to understand the Gospel, but to understand our culture too.

This series, inspired by some of the central themes of life observed in art, philosophy, literature and film aims to both inspire and equip us to see what we believe worked out through the whole of our lives, and to be better equipped for dialogue.

Chaos theology is theology for the 21st Century, the belief that in the midst of all the mess and brokeness there is meaning, connectedness and hope.

Declaration of interdependence

I realised today that the are some foundational principles that I am working on, that shape my thinking about church, but that many people may not be aware of these, or even agree with them. I love that phrase at the beginning of the US Declaration of independence 'We hold these truths to be self-evident' and I thought it would be interesting to express our declaration. This is just for starters, leave me comments and I will add more as we think of them.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all people are created equal, that we do not judge on the basis of education, wealth, appearance, gender or race.

That the church exists primarily not for the sake of its members, but rather for its non-members.

That we are part of church not for what we receive, but for what we can give.

That every member of the church is important as part of the body of Christ, and shapes who we are by their character and abilities.

Grown up christianity

1 Corinthians has been making us think a lot about freedom.
One of the tensions is the fact that freedom is risky. How much should we give people freedom to make mistakes? Lots of us are formed by our experience of being part of youth work at church, where a priority is keeping young people safe, protecting them from the dangers of being sucked into a world that they are ill equipped to handle (though maybe equipping them should be more our priority than protecting them). We want to give people clear guidelines, black and white principles which very quickly become rules.

I remembered yesterday one of the experiences of moving from studying a subject at school to studying it at University. There was a moment at the start of our study when our lecturers would say 'remember all that stuff you were taught at school... well good though it was, things are not as simple as that'. We had to unlearn as much as we learned in those first months.

I wonder should we have the same milestones in our Christian life. Moments when we say 'Remember that stuff you were taught in youth group or Christian Union? Well good though it was, things are not as simple as that.'
Relating to God as adults requires us to own the freedom that he gives us, and that includes the freedom to make and learn from our mistakes.

emerging church

This is one of the movements i am most inspired by. Can I recommend emergingchurch.info and also blogs by andrew jones and a friend of mine si johnson as starting points.

It is a movement shaped within postmodernity, reimagining church incarnate in the 21st century. There are many overlaps between emerging church and what we are up to at COTC
however as ever when it comes to movements i tend to rather exist on the margins (it is a personality thing).
One of the things which defines church on the corner which is different from many emerging churches, is that we deliberately exist within the anglican church, valuing much of the tradition and cultural heritage that anglicanism brings us, but doing church in a way which is intended to be prophetic both within that tradition and in the cultural milieu of London.
If there is a critisism I have of some emergent christianity it is the rearranging deckchairs on the titanic one. It sometimes seems to be about cosmetic change in church practice rather than systemic change in the hearts and minds of the people who form church communities.
I am really grateful for the work of those pioneering new models of church and worship outside the structures of establish church, and i hope we can support and learn from what they are doing.