thePROJECT:2, ‘In The Flesh’, Saturday 20th June, Edinburgh.

The first section of thePROJECT:2 runs 12.00 – 7.00pm @ The Lot, 4-6 Grassmarket, and St Columba By the Castle, 14 Johnston Terrace

12.00 – 4.30pm @ The Lot, 4-6 Grassmarket

12.00: Gathering, and creative activities for the young and young-at-heart, to dip in and out of (continuing from 12-4)

* The Big Knit: Bone combs, and personal possession of nits unnecessary… bring yer fingers to add yer own knit, purl and stitch action to the burgeoning tea cosy/ balaclava/ windcheater/ jersey/ sock (delete as appropriate)… a big woolie thing we’ll make together! (continuous activity)

* Gentle City Walking: Experience the urban curiosities of Embro; hear sounds you’ve never heard; see things you’d not have noticed; explore your sensations, feelings and thoughts on a magically mundane mystery tour… (continuous activity)

* Body Partying: a collaborative, additive artwork, where we’ll add pictures of bits of bodies together to create a huge picture (eventually) of thePROJECT Body! (continuous activity)

* Videovoxpopping: Smile, scowl, pull a face, crack a joke, what you feel on film. Let yer soul be captured and your opinions be articulated in cinematic style… (continuous activity)

* Kissing Booth: a chance to kiss SCOTT PAGET and selected members of thePROJECT steering group – ok, that’ll be optional – and to bend their ears with your ideas, hear what they’ve got to say. An opportunity to chat about what thePROJECT is, wasn’t and mibbe could be. (continuous activity)

* The Scratch Mary Poppins: Join PHIL WHITE in recreating what has become an incisive parable for our credit-crunch times… supercalifragalistication assured! (Rehearsals at St Columba, 1-3, performance 4.00).

12.45 – 1.45:

CoMusika with JANE BENTLEY: A corporately created, improvisational, invitational musical event where there is no audience, only players on a journey of increasing mutuality, communication, and communion, creating ‘music in the moment’. Jane will be harnessing your creative talents to make this happen.

2.00 – 2.30:

Non-Cabbage & Ambulances? with ROB MACKENZIE and ANDREW PHILIP: two of Scotland’s finest poets share their insightful, powerful and witty words. 2.45-3.45: Fischy Goings-On with, oh yes… FISCHY MUSIC: join SUZANNE ADAM, SANDY BUTLER and JED MILROY for a musical bonanza, chock-full of fun, emotions, sprituality and craziness!

4.00-4.15:

The Scratch Mary Poppins – The Performance: PHIL WHITE and thePROJECT SCRATCH COMPANY (that’s all of youz!) perform the perfect parable!

12.00 – 7.00pm @ St Columba-By-the-Castle, 14 Johnston Terrace

12.00: Gathering, free tea & coffee available in Columba Hall (all day). And hinging-oot on the Terrace.

12.15 – 12.45: Welcome & Introduction

1.00 – 2.15: ‘Alternative Futures – How Art Can Capture The Imagination‘: with BEKI BATESON. Columba Hall.

1.00 – 2.15: ‘A Seed… Or A Weed?‘: with STEWART CUTLER and JULIE WILSON. Columba Sanctuary.

2.30 – 3.45: ‘Copenhagen 2009 – crucifixion of Mother Earth or resurrection of the Cosmic Christ?’: with ROSS LOVERIDGE. Columba Hall.

2.30 – 3.45: ‘Mosh Pit’ – art, faith and culture in Scotland’: with DOUG GAY & others. Columba Sanctuary.

4.00 – 5.00: ‘1o Things They Never Told Me About Jesus’: with JOHN L. BELL. Columba Hall.

5.00 – 7.00: Eating Together: bring your own food, eat together with fellow PROJECTiles.

6.00 – 7.00: ‘Between Silence & Light’: an experiental time and space for worship & reflection, with STEVE BUTLER & friends.

7.00pm – 1.00am @ The Pleasance Cabaret Bar, 60 The Pleasance

7.30: ROB MACKENZIE & ANDREW PHILIP: more worsmithery from the masters. More info (Rob)… More info (Andrew)…

8.15: JAKE TATTON: beautiful punky banshee ballistics.

9.00: WE SEE LIGHTS: quirky indie pop perfection.

10.00: IAIN ARCHER: Norn Irelan’s finest, Ivor Novello winning songer-singwriter.

12.00: Solstice marking: a short celebration of midsummer with STEVE BUTLER.

I was invited to lead a workshop at Holy City in Glasgow last night.  I mentioned before that I was delighted to be asked but now terrified…

Well, it wasn’t that scary!  In fact, I liked it a lot.

I’ve known about Holy City for ages and it’s been on my ‘I’d quite like to go to that’ list but I’ve never got round to going.  I’m so glad I did, even if it took an invite to get me there (perhaps a lesson in that?).

People gather from 7pm for a chat and around 7.20pm new songs are taught for the worship later in the evening and the workshops are plugged.  Then at 7.30pm people choose their workshop and go there for an hour.

There was a great variety of workshops last night, all around the idea of ‘telling’.

Mine was called ‘Telling Signs?’ and I tried to encourage people to talk about what signs of new life they were seeing outside the church and to ask what the church’s response to those should be.  I think it was a good discussion but in many ways the ‘Emerging Church’ is so nebulous that it’s difficult for people to grasp which part we are talking about… or to want to categorise these communities at all.

Worship was the most subversive act I’ve seen in a church for a long time.  We thought about telling… and those who because of a decission by the General Assembly are not allowed to tell and the issue they are not allowed to tell of… sexuality.

Deep words, beautiful music, conversation and actions in an amazing space with great people.

I’ll be back… next term.  And if you find yourself in Glasgow on the last Sunday of the month then you could do much worse than spend some time at Holy City.

Dear PROJECTiles,                                  [release 1 distrib 280509]

Details are slowly leaking out for thePROJECT – In The Flesh which will happen somewhere in Edinburgh on June 20th.

You’ve been most patient, and that’s both much appreciated and deserves rewarding. So here’s the first of several updates on P:2 for yer info and delektashin.

Confirmed to date….A veritable cornocupia of wonders, including:

Musicality… IAIN ARCHER, WE SEE LIGHTS, JAKE TATTON.

Wordsmithery… ROB McKENZIE

Workshops… DOUG GAY, BEKI BATESON, STEWART CUTLER, ROSS LOVERIDGE… on art, faith, culture, emerging church, climate change challenges.

Creativity: Gentle City Walks, Videovoxpop, Scratch Mary Poppins, mibbe even a Big Knit

Worship: with Steve Butler & friends.

This is just for starters… so watch this space for more details… (and check yer emails!). Registration and ticketing details imminently.

the PROJECT (Scotland)
… a Scottish festival of arts, culture & faith

Questionnaire: thePROJECTquestionnaire
Web: theprojectscotland
Facebook: www.facebook.com/group
Bebo: www.bebo.com/theprojectscotland
Twitter: http://twitter.com/theprojectscot

I’ve been invited to lead one of the workshops at Holy City in Glasgow this Sunday evening.  The stop this month in the journey to discover the demands, delights and dilemmas of discipleship is ‘Speaker’s Corner’.

The blurb for my bit says…

‘Telling signs?’
‘Emerging Church’ is one (of many) tags given to odd, quirky, marginal forms of being church that exist in or outside of the mainstream? What and where are they? What do they mean? And do they matter? A man who has his finger on the pulse of such things is STEWART CUTLER. He is Children and Youth Development Officer for the URC in Scotland.

Like all these kinds of invitations I’m delighted to be asked then gripped by fear about what to do!  I might talk about that.  It seems kind of apt…  After all, it is Pentecost.

Come and join us at 7pm in Renfield St Stephens, Bath Street, Glasgow.

On Monday night, after the drama, confusion and intrigue of the Overture discussion that never happened something important happened… something which is at the heart of the future of the church.

It was late in the evening when Bishop Graham Cray spoke to a disappointingly small group of people as part of the Emerging Church fringe event.

Bishop Cray is the man in charge of Fresh Expressions, the joint project between the Church of England and the Methodist Church, and he has been working in the area of pioneering ministry for years.

His first sentence was a response to a video of a great youth project at the Steeple Church in Dundee.  ‘That’s great’, he said, ‘but that’s not what I’m talking about.’

In that one sentence he summed up the concern I have with the direction of the ‘Emerging Church’ conversations and support available through the Church of Scotland.

Graham spoke of ministry across cultural boundaries, of growing churches where there are none and of a mixed economy of church.  He shed light on the how and why, shared encouragement and pointed out some pitfalls.

All that requires legislation, changes in recognition and training of the ministry needed for these new expressions and funding.

I’ve heard little this week to convince me that the Church of Scotland has a corporate awareness of this area or a grasp of where it is heading, despite the good work of the development officer for this area.

The event was webcast.  It would be great if Graham’s talk could be shared wider.

Last week’s sermon focused on John 15: 9-17 and used some material from the excellent OneKirk worship material and from the equally excellent Lawrence Moore’s blog, Disclosing New Worlds.  As always, youth thoughts and comments are wel,comed.

Tomorrow afternoon I’ve been invited to be part of a panel at International Christian College to discuss what the Emerging Church is, what can be learned from it (by the evangelical church I guess) and what the downsides of emerging church are.

Along with me there will be people on the panel who know actual stuff, so any help, ideas, thoughts or general prayers or good last minute excuses would be welcome so I don’t look like a complete idiot (again).

Thanks. (off to look up what hermeneutics are/is/were/taste like!)

This is Sunday’s sermon, based on Luke 24: 13-35, looks at the encounter between two of Jesus’ followers and a stranger they meet on the way to Emmaus.

The story about the monastery comes from alt.spirit at metro.m3: Alternative Urban Spirituality which is well worth getting your hands on!

Let me know what you think!  Please!!!

Last night the Together @ MCT community walked the road to Emmaus with those two disciples who met Christ when they least expected.

Here are a couple of the stations:

1. Crosses
It’s only been a couple of weeks
Since the joy of Palm Sunday
With singing and shouting and hallelujahs

It’s only been a couple of weeks
Since the joy turned to fear
With betrayal and suspicion.

It’s only been a couple of weeks
Since the sky turned black
And He said “It is finished”

It’s only been a couple of weeks
Since the tomb lay empty
And death was defeated

It’s only been a few weeks
But how quickly that Easter feeling fades
And real life returns to normal

So think back
To all that has happened:

“The chief priests and our rulers handed him over to be sentenced to death, and they crucified him; but we had hoped that he was the one who was going to redeem Israel. And what is more, it is the third day since all this took place.  In addition, some of our women amazed us. They went to the tomb early this morning but didn’t find his body. They came and told us that they had seen a vision of angels, who said he was alive.  Then some of our companions went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said, but him they did not see.”

3. Looking back at what has been

“Are you only a visitor to Jerusalem and do not know the things that have happened there in these days?”

The followers of Jesus had watched it all go wrong
But there was hope…

Are we shaped by our past?

Do the things that have happened to us make us who we are?

Or do we start afresh each day?

“… it is the third day since all this took place.”

Do we listen to what Jesus tells us?
Do we believe what we hear?

“In addition, some of our women amazed us. They went to the tomb early this morning but didn’t find his body. They came and told us that they had seen a vision of angels, who said he was alive.  Then some of our companions went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said, but him they did not see.“

They saw a vision of angels who said he was alive!
And yet we are on the road heading the other way.

God can be scary sometimes.
What is hard about believing in Jesus for you?

6. Disappearing

[Light a candle]

It must have been great
To be there with Jesus
Eating
Talking
Sharing

The light of the world
There
With you
His face lit by the flickering candle

…and he disappeared from their sight.

[Blow out the candle]

And he was gone
Just like that

And they were alone again.

For that moment when the candle is not lit everything seems darker
But them our eyes get used to the light
And we realise that it isn’t as dark as we thought
That there is still light in the world

And that we can be that light

How will you shine?
How will you make someone else’s life lighter this week?

I feel sorry for Thomas.  He gets some bad press, mostly so John can make a point to his readers I think.  I’m not even sure Thomas had doubts.  I think he had questions, so that’s where this week’s sermon focuses… on questions.

I was at Lanark Greyfriars and the readings were John 20: 19-31, 1 John 1:1 – 2:2 and Acts 4: 32-35

As always, your comments, suggestions and most of all questions are very welcome.