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December 31, 2005
What does the cross say?
From Youth Pastor
Posted by ian at 03:20 PM | Comments (0)
2005 has been and gone
Woosh, that was 2005! How scary! I feel like years have taken a cue from Chocolate manufacturers i.e if you can't put the price up then make the product smaller or shorter!
In my ironic tribute to TV (even though I don't actually have one) I will attempt to do a 'best of 2005' thing here!
It's been a good blogging year with some more youth ministry/youth work blogs appearing. My favourite new blog in this arena was from Marko, it's provided some profound thought and laugh out loud moments! All the blogs on the blogroll have contributed to Youth work/Church/ministry debate though and it's been a blast .... I'm also really chuffed that the number of people who comment has grown, I love the dialogue that develops. Thanks :-)
Most profound blogging occurance was being in TSK's seminar at Greenbelt on The Spirituality of Blogging which was incredibly useful, wise AND a chance to meet bloggers who I only knew by their tags. Cool! TSKs bloggers prayer is genius AND an important challenge!
One of the reasons that I blog is so that there's actually a record of stuff I've come across. Before the blog I used to find stuff and think, "Oh I must remember that!" and then promptly forget it. I still forget stuff but at least I can find it again now :-)
I've had a trawl through Youthblog 2005 and here's my fav' bits!
1. Someone asked, "How do you know you are called to youth ministry?" which I thought was a great question. The thinking and discussion happened here.
2. The biggest source of hits on youthblog for a while was around names for youth groups? This entry and the resulting comments/entries still gets dug up loads.
3. Calvin and Hobbes are regular "contributors" to the blog and this fusion of Calvinism and Calvin's love of snow made me laugh!
4. The whole "Emerging shed" silliness was great fun and it made me laugh hugely that progress on the shed I was building was being watched via the web. Even funnier though was that I emerged number 1 on google if you wanted to know about Creosote substitute! True! (although I've now slipped to number 2!)
5. 2005 was the year when branding young people as "hoodies" really seemed to take hold. It's been good to see various stuff challenging this unhelpful stigmatising and condemming of young people. Articles here and here. Final word to FYT who are doing the most to challenge media attitudes to young people!
Posted by ian at 09:39 AM | Comments (1)
December 23, 2005
Have a Cool Yule
"Welcome to my Christmas [blog], I'd like to thank you for the year. So I'm sending you this Christmas card to say it's nice to have you here" (Your starter for 10, what song did I lift this quote from?)
Well I'm signing off for Christmas. This will be the last entry until New Years eve when I'll put up my ironic tribute to TV Scheduling, ie THE 'BEST' of YOUTHBLOG 2005! *Laughing*
I'm looking forward to the break enormously. Spending time with my family, Catching up with friends, Carols at Church, Cycling, Watching "Muppets Christmas Carol". Nice!
Thanks for being part of Youthblog this year, I wish you a great Christmas filled with hope, peace, friendship and snow! May your Cracker jokes be funny, your wonder be kindled and your Joy contagious as you celebrate the pivotal moment of all history, Merry Christmas!
The wondrous gift is given!
So God imparts to human hearts
The blessings of his heaven.
No ear may hear his coming,
But in this world of sin,
Where meek souls will receive him, still
The dear Christ enters in"
Posted by ian at 09:29 AM | Comments (4)
December 22, 2005
While Shepherds washed their socks
When I was 9 I had a near encyclopaedic knowledge of alternative (I mean silly) words for Christmas carols! To my horror I seem to have forgotten nearly the whole repetoire! My daughter is now at an age where these are perfect for her sense of humour but sadly, beyond "While shepherds washed" and [Good king Wenceslas] "got a snow ball in the snout, made it all uneven" I am struggling with sufficient content for this important aural tradition to be passed on to the next generation.
Contributions gratefully recieved! Thank you :-)
(on a related issue I was listening to "The Holly and Ivy" last night ... is it me or is that a really strange carol?)
Posted by ian at 08:50 AM | Comments (8)
December 20, 2005
Christmas Lights
Not conent with JUST lighting up the outside of your house? Check out SOUND and LIGHT via Steve Tilley
BTW does anyone recognise the piece of music?
Posted by ian at 11:11 AM | Comments (3)
Christmas makes me nervous
I am being challenged by this piece written by Charles Moore (via Pip Wilson)
"Christmas makes me nervous. The Infinite who came in a feeding trough is not the kind of God I want. He is too powerless for my liking. Such a God is an embarrassment, not just to the Herods of this world, but to all who are enamored with themselves and their own potency. I don’t want this God. I have an inn to offer, decorated for Christmas, not a stinking stall.
God exists in weakness and comes to those who reach up to him with empty hands. He is neither useful nor helpful. He came and still comes, not to solve our problems or answer our questions or fulfill our needs or bless our endeavors, but to expose our problems, to question our answers, to be our need, and to point us to his kingdom. In Christ, God enters time and space to turn our world upside down and inside out. “Valleys are made high, mountains are laid low.” We are left bewildered, undone"
Posted by ian at 12:18 AM | Comments (0)
December 19, 2005
The last splurge of the year!
I reckon you'll be too busy on Boxing day to read another Youthblog splurge (you may be too busy today!) but here begineth the Splurge for this Monday.
I took my 11 year old quad-biking for his Birthday. Thankfully he managed to control the throttle and sometimes the brake (he has cerebral palsy) and he loved it. Unrestricted by concepts such as fear or consequences he razzed about the place with an epic grin on his face. Very proud of him!
Anyway, what's what? The twelve days of Kitchmass is back thanks to those groovy people at Ship of Fools. Look and recoil!
I'm delighted that the JCB song by Nizlopi has made it to number 1 in the UK, if you've not seen the video then check it out. I really like the title of their album, Half these songs are about you. I want to get this CD.
Richard found the Savage Chickens web site which I love. Doug kindly gave me permission to post this cartoon from the site, WELL WORTH a visit!
Other Stuff: The Buncefield Oil refinery fire affected the local community more than I realised, find out how and ways to help via Peats weblog.
I will be blogging sporadically over the next few days, so do pop in if you are virtually passing!
And finally: I still love the snowball fight game but having completed the bonus level after level 9 I have to retire from the sport.
Posted by ian at 12:39 PM | Comments (0)
December 18, 2005
Byker Grove Youth Club
The Hutchinson unearthed this virtual youth club game! As a model for youth work it is somewhat flawed as it works totally on the entertainment approach and unsusprisingly the teens get bored quickly! Great fun though and it's wonderfully easy to run revenue generating events, I ended up with more money than I could spend. Very dissapointed therefore not to even make the high score board? I also liked the fact I could put a trampoline on the balcony!!!! next to the swimming Pool!!! Risk assesment anyone, LOL!
Thinky bit: I guess it does raise a question of what people think youth work is actually about. If the perception is that it's just about orgnaising lots of entertainment then we've got some 'informal' educating to do eh?
But check it out for a little escapist fun and you don't even need to acredit any outcomes! Click here and then select Byker Grove. Nice!
Posted by ian at 12:07 AM | Comments (1)
December 17, 2005
King Kong is monster
King Kong is awesome! What a film. It's an epic (in the old fashioned sense) on an enormous scale. King Kong himself is utterly convincing (I think at a subconscious level I accepted they'd managed to find a RADA trained 30ft Gorilla). The scenes from the Empire State building are vertigo inducing!
It has a great feel too and somehow manages to be a historical (1920's) movie that's up to date in it's quality but has an aged, slightly cliched (in a good way) stylee! At three hours it's long ... very long but I guess having Directed LOTR then Peter Jackson is going to struggle to do 107 minutes films EVER again. You should see this film at the cinema with the youth group! It's monster!
Those of you who know me understand that I like films with happy endings (I'm an incurable romantic) This film manages to have a sad ending but the guy and the girl do get together. As it's such an awesome film I'm going to accept this sad/happy compromise :-)
There's themes of greed, loyalty, love and dishonesty in the film but at the moment I've not thought of obvious clips that would be so useful for sessions.
Usability for teaching and discussion
Watchability for a youth weekend
Posted by ian at 12:29 AM | Comments (0)
December 16, 2005
Vertigo 2 Oxford
Vertigo is back. 4th Feb. Bring it on! Download file
Posted by ian at 11:57 AM | Comments (0)
Goodwill to men?
I need some of the collective blog wisdom please. The question broadly is, am I being a curmudgeon?
The statutory Youth Centre (I am on the team at) is hired by a Church on Sunday mornings. This means that the main room is often be-decked with Church and Christian posters (and all the posters about sexual health are covered over by the church). The presence of Church posters and the lack of sexual health ones continues into the week.
Anyway yesterday was the Christmas lunch for all the statutory youth team who work at the centre! On the wall the Church had put a large poster that proclaimed,
"Peace on Earth
Goodwill to all men"
Am I being a curmudgeon for finding this sexist and non inclusive? (I know that MEN in this sense is meant to be in the mankind sense). What do you think? Is it alienating for a Church to be putting posters up that imply (especially to the young people) that women are off less value (Is this my interpretation?). Is 'professional' youth work messing with my objectivity?
So question 1. am I being a curmudgeon? "Need Input?"
oh ..... and question 2. which I guess flows on was I wrong to cross out the word "men" and change it to "people?"
Posted by ian at 08:45 AM | Comments (12)
December 15, 2005
Young People yesterday
"Seven Hundred years ago London had a real yob problem. The city was full of teenage apprentices, who hung out in gangs in and around old St. Paul's, which in the days before shopping malls was the only covered public area in the city. These medieval 'hoodies' shot birds with arrows, broke windows and vandalised statues. Bishop Braybroke was so cross, he tried to excommunicate the boys for their 'insolence, idleness and evil minds"
Source: The Metro via Barrie
Posted by ian at 12:24 AM | Comments (0)
December 14, 2005
Spirituality is ..... important to talk about
I'm really glad that I invested a couple of days in going to the Spirituality Is conference in Salisbury. Having said that however I am unable yet to crystalise a definitive list of things that I gained. I absorbed the research, encountered some methodology, recognised an ethos BUT if these were the metaphoric jelly, blancmange and cream ... they have not settled, in my mind, into a recognisable Trifle yet!
The conference billed itself as,
"Young people's spirituality in the UK: Conference on the findings of the Spirituality of Young People research project at Sarum College"
It also saw the launch of these findings as a book, Buried Spirituality. It was fantastic to hear the result of Phil Rankin's research and just how willing young people were to talk about spirituality when given the opportunity. His research, findings and proposals were worth every penny to hear.
Where it got complicated was that the majority of the conference was, 'over to you' and collective looks at where next. For some reason the discussion really touched some frustrations in youth workers and much pain-from &criticism-of the church emerged. Kind of messy and I wish I could claim to be an objective observer rather than a contributor to this, sadly I can't.
The conference was also partly delivered by four 18-24 year olds from the four segments of the UK. It was great to have their input. They added a great dynamic to the conference but all was not straight forward given all that was being discussed and opened up.
For me the conference caught me by surprise I think. I was just expecting to absorb the research and to hear Phil Rankin speak more fully on his research. Instead an excitement about what Phil was saying that we were trying to earth into a Church we care passionately about but in which we see huge hurdles to moving forward, created a messy and slightly bewlidering mix. None of which detracts from the opportunity the learning from this report affords us. I guess we just ran out of time!
I am so glad I went though. I have learnt an enormous amount and encountered an opportunity that could benefit young people significantly. Spending time with Phil Rankin was a real privilege, as was spending time with the other delegates.
Active Phil has written more coherently on this than I
Posted by ian at 02:46 PM | Comments (1)
Advent Celebrations
It seems that not all advent calenders contain chocolate!
Posted by ian at 08:16 AM | Comments (3)
December 13, 2005
Blog introductions
In a couple of hours New Zealand blogger, Michael ( Theobloby ) arrives here. I only know him through his blog and vica versa. I'm not sure how you greet someone you know a bit but have never met? Maybe we'll have to type rather than talk for the the first few minutes of our conversation!
I really enjoyed the SPIRITUALITY IS conference and will write up some stuff soon. Sarum College lacked Wi-fi but the food was awesome :-) as was the company!
Gotta dash .......
Posted by ian at 01:06 PM | Comments (1)
December 12, 2005
The urge to Splurge
A formal welcome to the business of Monday! Grant has published a list of useful stuff that New Youth Pastors should know, its a highly subjective approach but there is wisdom among the rubber chickens! Meanwhile the whole of Christendom seems to have gone Alpha loopy over Narnia, Dan Kimball reflects that the Da Vinci code may be a more honest point of engagement. Andy also expresses reservations.
"Free Stuff!" Words beaten only by "pay rise" in the mind of youth workers. Check out Simply Youth Ministry who are giving away Christmasssy type useful downloadable stuff!
Advent wise I'm still logging on religiously (if you see what I mean) each day to Dave's blog
Anyway I'm at the Spirituality Is conference in Salisbury, so see you there or catch you here when I report back in on Tuesday. Talking of contemporary spirituality, please come up with a caption for this ......
Posted by ian at 07:56 AM | Comments (6)
December 11, 2005
today Youthblog is expected to ....
Among the things that annoy me at the moment (I'll spare you the list) is for the BBC News in the morning to contain an item that says,
"In a speech today, Tony Blair will say ... etc etc etc"
Why is what someone is going to say, NEWS! Especially when the news covers what he does say and then the evening news covers what he has said! It's not just Tony Blair obviously but you see what I mean.
(Plus how boring must it be to have to attend a speech when the BBC have told you what is going to be said?)
Anyway: Tomorrow Youthblog is expected to deliver another splurge in which he'll blather on about stuff, include a couple of useful links & illustrate it with a funny picture!
Posted by ian at 06:15 PM | Comments (1)
Wooosh went the weekend
At Lunch time on Friday we had the 'official' turning on of the Christmas Lights in my department at Church House! I work in an open plan office of about 14 people and among our collective idiosyncrasies is the tendency to go a tad over the top at Christmas. We have two christmas trees, Streamers, tinsle and the like EVERYWHERE and all manner of illuminations. I'd also built some wooden frames so that some areas of the office became Grotto's and had been decorated and lit accordingly. The total effect produced by all the decorations is awesome. We invited everyone else in Church house, put on a buffett for Charity AND the piece de resistance was getting Bishop Richard to officially turn the lights on! Cool huh?
Anyway before I knew it the afternoon had gone and I was on duty at the drop-in, had an OK session with the teenagers and all though still not achieving much there were a lot less incidents to deal with. From there I met up with Newbury Youth Council (GREAT bunch of teenagers) and we headed down to Avon Tyrell in the New Forest for a residential training event we were doing with them. Had a blast but I headed back early as on Sunday my eldest boy has his birthday ..... Church, birthday cake, jelly and games. Fab!
What have I learnt this weekend? Not to stay up with teenagers watching a Peter Kay DVD until the small hours of the morning! Very funny though!
Posted by ian at 05:39 PM | Comments (1)
December 09, 2005
Nice one FYT!
FYT have produced a couple of promotional pictures in their campaign against the pervading 'populist anti-youth dogma' In their words:
"Frontier Youth Trust (FYT) has recently launched a post card campaign to challenge the plethora of negative images about young people in UK society. A survey by the magazine Young People Now (13-19 October 2004) found that 71% of press articles concerning young people had a negative tone, only 14% were positive. This impression that every young person in the country is out to attack, mug or vandalise property is far from the truth"
Posted by ian at 11:44 AM | Comments (2)
December 08, 2005
Calling all Oxford(ish) youth bods
On Wednesday Michael Treston is visiting me from New Zealand. We'll be in Oxford and around for the day and he's interested in seeing UK youth ministries, rural stuff (Hello Simon) and any emerging/youth church type stuff that's happening. If anyone is free on Wednesday and fancies a meet up for coffee, lunch etc then please shout! .. actually that won't work as I won't hear you from Newbury, maybe you could e-mail?
Posted by ian at 09:41 PM | Comments (3)
Chav a nice Christmas
Not sure this will make sense to anyone outside the UK but if you've ever wondered how the Christmas story might sound Chav style, here's the answer:
There's this bird called Mary, yeah? She's a virgin (wossat then?). She's not married or nuffink, but she's got this boyfriend, Joe, innit? He does joinery an' that. Mary lives with him in a crib dahn Nazaref.
One day Mary meets this bloke Gabriel. She's like `Oo ya lookin at?' Gabriel just goes 'You got one up the duff, you have.’ Mary's totally gobsmacked. She gives it to him large 'Stop dissin' me yeah? I ain't no Kappa-slapper. I never bin wiv no one!'
So Mary goes and sees her cousin Liz, who's six months gone herself. Liz is largin' it. She's filled with spirits, Barcardi Breezers an' that. She's like 'Orright, Mary, I can feel me bay-bee in me tummy and I reckon I'm well blessed. Think of all the extra benefits an' that we are gonna get.' Mary goes 'Yeah, s'pose you're right'
Mary an' Joe ain't got no money so they have to ponse a donkey, an' go dahn Bethlehem on that. They get to this pub an' Mary wants to stop, yeah? To have her bay-bee an' that. But there ain't no room at the inn, innit? So Mary an' Joe break an' enter into this garridge, only it's filled wiv animals. Cahs an' sheep an' that.
Then these three geezers turn up, looking proper bling, wiv crowns on their heads. They're like `Respect, bay-bee Jesus', an' say they're wise men from the East End.
Joe goes: 'If you're so wise, wotchoo doin' wiv this Frankenstein an' myrrh? Why dincha just bring gold, Adidas and Burberry?'
It's all about to kick off when Gabriel turns up again an' sez he's got another message from this Lord geezer. He's like 'The police is comin an' they're killin all the bay-bees. You better nash off to Egypt.' Joe goes 'You must be monged if you think I'm goin' dahn Egypt on a minging donkey'
Gabriel sez 'Suit yerself, pal. But it's your look out if you stay.' So they go dahn Egypt till they've stopped killin the first-born an' it's safe an' that. Then Joe and Mary and Jesus go back to Nazaref, an' Jesus turns water into Stella.
APPY CRIMBO
Posted by ian at 04:53 PM | Comments (1)
And do you know who he was?
I found this on KTvS's blog this morning and thought it was fantastic. It's called
'Sharon's Christmas Prayer' by John Shea. Enjoy:
She was five,
sure of the facts,
and recited them
with slow solemnity
convinced every word
was revelation.
She said
they were so poor
they had only peanut butter and jelly sandwiches
to eat
and they went a long way from home
without getting lost. The lady rode
a donkey, the man walked, and the baby
was inside the lady.
They had to stay in a stable
with an ox and an ass (he he)
but the Three Rich Men found them
because a star lited the roof
Shepherds came and you could
pet the sheep but not feed them.
Then the baby was borned.
And do you know who he was?
Her quarter eyes inflated
to silver dollars,
The baby was God.
And she jumped in the air
whirled round, dove into the sofa
and buried her head under the cushion
which is the only proper response
to the Good News of the Incarnation.
Mark 10:15
"I tell you the truth, anyone who will not receive the
kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it."
Posted by ian at 08:47 AM | Comments (0)
Mosaic Youth Service
My job is pretty varied, which I love, and I'm out and about quite a lot of the time. This is also a good survival strategy because I think my fellow-communal-office-dwellers would kill me if I spent more than 4 hours in the office! (Life lesson number 7462, Not everyone shares my sense of humour)
Anyway Sunday night found me in Thame visiting the MOSAIC Youth Service because they wanted me to do a kind of audit on Health and Safety, Child Protection and related issues. I had a fabulous time though despite the rather mundane nature of my invitation. The worship was awesome and the whole evening with it's relaxed style, humour, worship and Cafe was ace. The real buzz for me though was that virtually everything was Peer Led. The event has seven teams:
1. Worship
2. Teaching
3. Sound/Tech stuff
4. Cafe
5. Welcome/Community
6. prayer
7. Set up/Take down
This really gives the event energy and ownership. On this particular night one of the lads (17) from the 'teaching' team gave a talk on the need to put God given gifts into action. He said,
"I was going to call this 'Ministries' but that sounded too Churchy so I'm calling this GIN .... Getting involved Night"
Cool huh! Youthblog suggests you have a GIN night with your group!
Posted by ian at 12:40 AM | Comments (0)
December 07, 2005
Buy Nothing Christmas
This might be an idea for a Christmas type session with the youth group. Marko posted a link to this article that has a scary/funny list of pointless gifts. (How have you managed up until now without 'spray on mud' and 'pyjamas for dogs' eh?) You could use these as a quiz, make some up and get people to guess which are real and which are made up OR Powerpoint the pictures and use them for a link into looking at consumerism at Christmas.
If you're going to run a session on this then it's worth looking at Buy Nothing Christmas and The Global Rich List.
As I blogged last year:
Bloggy Thinky bit: (I apply this to me too!) In what way is the Christmas we model to our young people different to the post-christian consumptive orgy that we see all around us?
Posted by ian at 10:50 AM | Comments (7)
December 05, 2005
Monday begat Splurge
Well here we are (virtually) once again. I've noticed activity in Blogdonia has slowed up big time as all the Parish based people get scarily busy, I shall however cobble something together in the hope that someone, somewhere has time to read this!
I've been thinking about language this week. I've noticed how much I use the word 'cool' and am aware that I may sound a bit of a dork. Try as I might though I can't find THE word that could replace 'cool' (suggestions welcome). Was amused though by this prophetc offering from Lark News on the dangers of attempting to be hip! Be ye warned!
If you're struggling to understand the 'emerging church' then this link won't help at all, if you do however it'll make you laugh (Purgatorio via Tall Skinny).
David steered a careful line between spamming and leaving a useful comment so I'll mention his Games Secretary site which aims to be a one stop URL for youth games!
This weekend I watched Herbie, Fully Loaded with the Family. It doesn't fit in with my normal rating system for youth weekends and teaching-usability really BUT I loved it. They've managed to retain the values/fun of the original but make a stonkingly good film for Kids and those who remember Herbie the first time around (A wonderful contrast to the crass pigs-ear that Dukes of Hazzard the film was).
And finally! With Wrist bands becoming very passé, I present to you the next hot thing in Cheesy Witness Ware:
Posted by ian at 12:38 AM | Comments (4)
December 02, 2005
Berkshire is the centre of "Gravity"
If you are within minibusable distance of Newbury then you may want to make a note of this youth service. Below is their spiel ....
Gravity...
A United Youth Christmas 'event' is happening on 17th December at St Mary's Church, Speen. 7.30pm
Brought to you by a group representing several churches. Our aim is to give the young people in the area the space to meet together and celebrate the true meaning of Christmas. It's for Christians and non Christians. There will be a great band, a fantastic speaker, prayer opportunities as well as food and drink!
E-mail The Simon to find out more
Posted by ian at 02:15 PM | Comments (2)
Hopeful Imagination
Andy left a comment about this great collabrative Advent Blog ... it's called Hopeful Imagination and I really like it! Thought it deserved a blog mention in it's own right!
"And so our watching time begins,
time for watching and waiting, for looking and longing,
for dreaming and wishing.
It is our time for lighting candles and looking for stars,
for opening calendar windows and counting the nights.
It is our time for the story,
the ancient story that weaves into our winters
stitching mystery and hope and a pure-gold thread into our long dark evenings"
And from the sublime to the wonderfully comedic, The brilliant and inimitable Dave Walker is bringing his unique talents and his obtuse view on things to the season of Advent. Nice!
Posted by ian at 12:39 AM | Comments (0)
And all Scripture is useful ...
And all Scripture is useful for marketing purposes it seems! Lifted this link from Marko (Thanks).
A little competition for December, see if you can come up with an even worse case of scripture being mis-appropriated to sell stuff!
Posted by ian at 12:01 AM | Comments (1)
December 01, 2005
AdventURLS
It's the first day of ADVENT and youth workers across the land have already eaten today's chocolate from the novelty calender (that they thought would be fun for the young people!)
IF you'd like an online Advent calender though have a look at Beliefnet: An interfaith site but the calender has some great Christian content.
For other Advent resources then this page from Anglicans Online is hard to beat .... you should be able to find stuff you can use!
Advent Prayer
Henri J.M. Nouwen
Lord Jesus,
Master of both the light and the darkness, send your Holy Spirit upon our preparations for Christmas.
We who have so much to do seek quiet spaces to hear your voice each day.
We who are anxious over many things look forward to your coming among us.
We who are blessed in so many ways long for the complete joy of your kingdom.
We whose hearts are heavy seek the joy of your presence.
We are your people, walking in darkness, yet seeking the light.
To you we say, "Come Lord Jesus!"
Posted by ian at 12:07 AM | Comments (1)