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Creative Worship Thought of the Day

Life under lockdown

News of this came to me through the MORPHE arts network.

One of their members has their work featured and developed as part of this commision.

What has lockdown been like for you? What language could help you communicate this?

Categories
Thought of the Day

Glen 21

Online and in person.

For many years lots of people have been working passionately to make a space and opportunity for young people in the Scottish Episcopal Church to gather.

While they are there they can worship together, experiment, study, learn and lead each other further into the ongoing experience of being Church.

Follow the link to find out how they are adapting to the conditions of 2021. You may be too old to attend, but we only become _too_ old when we loose the interest and ability to find out what the rest of our beautiful but dysfunctional family is up to.

THE LINK

(for those that missed it earlier.)

Categories
2021 Review Creative Worship Fresh Expressions

A Typical 3 Months

What does a typical 3 Months in Quartz look like?

This is a bit like asking what typical weather is like in a Scottish day. There will be a recognisable constant of four seasons, and at certain times of the year it is more probable that one will dominate the others. It is quite likely that all four will be experienced in one day though, and it is useful to learn to sunbathe with a wooly hat on.

Likewise, Quartz aims to develop spiritual literacy both within and beyond the St Johns community. It does this through using the arts to help people identify, explore and express spirituality. There is a recognisable consistency to this.

Working like a lead artist in a collaberative enterprise, I involve and support a loose collective of people in doing this together through projects and events – as well as developing my own practice through physical installations, experiental opportunities, and things like this website.

The substance of this adapts with context, follows up leads and opportunties, and also seeks to be ‘present’ in the community to generate opportunities that can be followed up. There is no blueprint, and although there is a Way, the path is discovered and made through walking.

The first phase of the project involved activities such as leading assemblies and RMPE classes in five local schools, attending a youthwork networking meeting, assisting with planning and leading at an experimental service in St Johns. We also put on larger scale multi media experiences. As Quartz we also developed ways of interacting at festivals through the use of things like labyrinths and weaving. Through this we helped people on the street to visualise #SensingSpirituality. In the background time was also set aside for mentoring a handful of young artists and providing hospitality for a student through an international ecumenical arrangement.

The context for this was found in long term background work with the D&G education commitee, and a national review of Religious Observance (RO) provision by the Scottish Government. St Johns was therefore placed to assist in the development and roll out of policy as well as provide continuous professional development training for staff. The support of a team within St John’s, allowed us to experiment with creative worship combining contemporary culture, inherited arts, and the church tradition handed down to us in ways which involved all ages. A long term professional engagement as Wordsmithcrafts with the living history and heritage sectors, provided a summer of events for the young artists to test their skills at. There is also a thriving Arts and Crafts sector in D&G and Dumfries hosts the largest free youth festival in Scotland. When opportunities arose to participate, we experimented. We used the framework for Time for Reflection within schools to develop guidelines for #SensingSpirituality activities in the wider community in ways which encouraged participation by people of all faiths and none without compromising their integrity.

The overall shape of activity was also influenced by the academic and Church calendars. This led to increased Quartz activity during school terms, and left room for the other Wordsmithcrafts activities not directly related to St Johns during the summer.

The previous post has a more practical description of what all of this looked like! And if this account is mostly of the first phase of the project there are probably three more recognisable phases to follow as the context and people involved changed.

If you were part of this stage, please use the comments option below to add your memories!

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Fresh Expressions Mission

Time to Reflect

There is a flow between thinking and doing. It is good to plan ahead, but sometimes you just need to get stuck in and get on with it. This was the approach we took with Quartz. The time has come now to sit back and reflect on what has happened, remember why we started out – and rest, to rediscover Love in the embrace of God.

We will keep track of this process on this blog. So what better way to start off than with a review of magazine articles from St Johns church.

View it here

Categories
Lent Thought of the Day

Moving On

The journey through Lent is completed now. Quartz met as a group during it, but I also know that other people have enjoyed just reading the posts and walking along in their own way.

Whichever of these approaches you identify with if you have found this way of doing things helpful please consider the ongoing help offered by the Jesuits around the world. You can find out more here:

Once I’ve taken some time out to smell spring I’m sure we will be doing more as Quartz too! Send an e-mail or subscribe to keep in touch.

Categories
Creative Worship Thought of the Day

Something for the morning?

When time seems to be running away from you. Stand still. Let the movement wash over you, even for just a moment.

The comforter surrounds us and is in us, and we can walk sensitive to the movement of the spirit.

Categories
Creative Worship Mission

50 days later

The festivities of Easter weekend, and the Easter holidays are over.

Scotland is still constrained by lockdown precautions.

What did the first Christians feel like during the days between pascha and pentecost?

After around 2000 years you might think that the surprise is worn out, but has it? All living beings adapt to survive. I’m taking some time out to review, reflect and dream up new ideas. Or perhaps this is better described as discovering new ways of adapting to recognise the presence of God and speak it in new tongues.

So here is something to help you anticipate what is coming.

Categories
Lent

Level up?

“Levelling up” is something which happens when all the experience gained in a game is used by the player to improve their characters skills.

Some games make this a very detailed process, and some players spend a lot of time working out the best way to spend their experience points so that they can complete the game on its most difficult setting.

You may not be familiar with this process. However in my lifetime gaming like this has moved on from being a niche interest. Every high street has a gaming shop, and gamers recently made headlines by taking on, and beating a hedge fund that treated a gamer business like monopoly money. It is global growth industry, and one in which Scottish companies and universities lead the way.

As a character levels up, the challenges they face also become more difficult. The rewards increase too! It is very different from just rolling dice and pushing an old boot round a board.

This is the end of the Quartz Lent retreat. We will meet for the last time this afternoon – but perhaps you will spend some time in the coming week “leveling up”

What have you experienced? What new adventures await? If you feel like you are just trudging round the board avoiding bankruptcy – perhaps it is time to seek out a new game?

Meeting ID: 852 1415 7058
Passcode: 451055

Categories
Lent

Easter Sunday!

Hope, a sunrise in the forest
Hope ! Hope as the sunrise dawning in the green of a forest of new hopes.

Christ is Risen!

Bleary eyed with our eyes full of sleep, we greet the dawn and a light which doesn’t blind us to what is happening – but which helps us see.

If we choose, this day can be the centre of time. Every Sunday an echo of creation being fulfilled, and every day a working out and releasing the potential laid within time from before time. The discovery of that which is truest to yourself and your environment.

Never laid upon us by an alien supreme entity but instead calling to us, through the example of Jesus descending to the lowest depths and returning with released captives.

Todays daily prayer material can be found here . If you’d simply like to join in the story of the Marys discovering the empty tomb this will take you to a song to sing and dance along to.

And a couple more …


We will have one more meeting after this. Next Sunday!

Categories
Lent Thought of the Day

Downside Up

This is not a new post. It seemed appropriate to me this morning though, at a time where everything is tumbling, and no one is sure what will emerge.

Follow the fool, but don’t be foolish 😉

Please click the button to read the original post. You may find it a lot to take in at first. Or, perhaps you are one of those who find this easy to understand and struggle with the ‘normal’ of formal Church. Either way, seek and you will find!