Today was at an event organised by the Church of Scotland called ‘Emerging Church - Centre Meets the Fringe’ in a new church development in Gilmerton, Edinburgh (domain of the inimitable Paul Beautyman).  We’re hearing about ‘emerging church’ from people who are ‘on the edges’.

In some ways the day so far has been inspiring and in others ways frustrating.

Firstly, it’s a Church of Scotland event and despite the large minority of people here from out with the CofS it’s a bit Church of Scotland centric.  That said, the issues that they face are the same as every other denomination.  

The tension between denominational church and the expressions of faith out there in the wild was very evident as is the thought that ‘emerging church’ is just for children and young people, that 11am is a rubbish time for a service and that power is both a problem and an opportunity.

But what is also evident is that there are people around who are thinking deeply about what the church is, how we express faith and how the ‘church’ of the future might look and be.

I’ll try and get some proper thoughts together later but for now I’m inspired by Paul Thomson’s vision of Christians in the wild, being followers of Christ where they are.  Groups of people who share a dream coming together to make that dream a reality.  Grasping that thought that the Good News is for the poor, that people outside the institution still have faith and are managing to resource their spiritual journey just fine thank you very much.

What’s my role in all of that?  I work for a denomination.  I try my best to support, challenge and encourage it.  To help it’s congregations to develop and wrestle with how to be church here and now.

But part of me has disengaged.  Part of me wonders what the Sunday morning thing is all about (you might have detected some of this in yesterday’s sermon).  My questions are similar to the ones voiced here by Paul and by Doug Gay.  What is the church?  How can we reclaim some of that rich heritage of the word church?  Where does liturgy fit and how can it resource a richer experience?  How do we understand heracy and orthodoxy?

Questions, questions.  I like the questions.

Sometimes it takes me ages to get something to the point where I know what it is and where it’s going.  My preparation for NYA2008 has been a bit like that.

The Church of Scotland’s Youth Assembly is in 3 weeks.  It already seems to have consumed much more time than it really should have.  I’m leading a team who are facilitating 3 two hour discussion sessions about Social Media.  I think part of the problem is that the topic is too interesting for me.  I’ve found myself off on all kinds of tangents but I think the main problem is I haven’t been able to see where it’s going.  Not so much the presentations.  I think the information about Social Media is is fine.

I know what I want to say, but we started with 4 topics which have kind of merged into 2.  Now I’m not sure how to manage that!  Oh well, more thought required.  I think if we can nail the discussion points the rest will follow.

So, why is Social Media relevant to the church?  Answers please…

John has blogged his thoughts HERE.  Well worth a look as usual!

I’ve been invited to head up a team delivering a debate stream (I’ll explain in a minute) at the Church of Scotland’s National Youth Assembly in September.

The debates have in the past followed a fairly traditional model where people would be given written information prior to the event, someone would present more information on the topic at the event and then participants would ask questions, discuss and decide what they think.

This year there will be four debate themes; The Media, Healthy Relationships, Sustainable Living and Future Church.  I’m involved with The Media one.  Each theme will have four sessions lasting 2 hours each to explore one aspect of their topic with around 60 young adults.

So, we’ve decided to take an adversarial approach setting our sessions up as discussions around the opposites like control v democracy.  We’re also going to concentrate mostly on ‘new media’.  Should be fun.

We’ve decided to use a wiki to both provide information beforehand and to post what we come up with during the event.  More on that nearer the time.