Tikhtak

Off to Scotland

Irfana and myself are off to Scotland for a weeks holiday. We will be visiting scottish film maker and good friend Andrew Bonner in Glasgow for the second year running and hope to see friends in Edinburgh as well. I am also looking forward to a few days in Oban at the end of the week. Hope to get some good photos of moody scottish scenery.

CMS WOW Holidayclub 3

Today the CMS WOW holiday club has come to an end. Yesterday we visited Sri Lanka and looked at the response of the diocese of Colombo to the Tsunami there and today we learnt about a bus stop church in Kenya reaching out to all the marginalised people you would never see in a church. We also was inspired by a video from stomp, who made percussion instruments from junk - a picture of how God uses those things the world casts aside to make into his own symphony. We also made our own instruments from rubbish and created our own percussion band, which will be performing on Sunday to the Church at Holy Trinity. Check out some of the highlights from the week in the WOW photo gallery

CMS WOW Holiday club 2

The Holiday club roles on..... Yesterday we looked at God's Creation and the importance for Christians to look after the world around. Irfana and I were able to share from our recent trip to India and especially the Arocha project for protecting elephants. Today we continued by looking at God's masterpiece...that's us!! We looked at the work of a blind school in central Asia, which works on the premise that We are all made in God's image and therefore worthy of love. Check out my youth e short blog for another inspiring story from the same school. We learnt about a girl who qualified from the school for the para olympic games and gave everyone a go at running with their eyes closed. Here are some mirrors the group made to take home, so that when ever they look in them they can see God's masterpiece :)

Set the Captives free

CMS's summer campaign Set the captives free is now up and running on the web I will be working at Soul survivor in August and then putting on 3 plays and workshops with Big Intent at Greenbelt.

CMS WOW Holiday Club

Today our CMS Window on the World Holiday club got under way at Holy Trinity Church. Clapham Common. We looked at the theme of God's Light and many things that reflect it. Meg Post led the craft brilliantly making a propeller go round using solar cells and dipping candles in coloured wax. Meg leads science workshops in schools up and down the country so we are very glad she can be part of our team The leaders were as much into it as the children. The country we focused on was Albania and we looked at a story of a family from Kosovo who had lived in England for 5 years having fled from the troubles there and then one night were forced to pack all their things in 20 minutes and leave England as their plea for Asylum had failed. The children really got into the story and thought hard as to what 5 things they would have taken. At the end we challenged each other to be reflectors of God's Love in the world around and especially to the stranger in our school or community. A great start to the week...

Bombers fail and life goes on

I was actually at Liverpool street when yesterdays incidents happened but didn't hear all the details till I got into a taxi at St Margrets station to go to All Nations Bible College. I immediately telephoned Irfana so she knew of my whereabouts as last time this caused a bit of stress as the phone lines were not working. I then focused on the day and had an inspiring meeting with Jill Ford, the course leader for the Arts and intercultural studies certificate. She has a vision for using the Arts to explore culture and it's value in mission and communicating the Gospel. It was strange to get on with life while at the same time not knowing what was actually going on in London. I am hoping that we at CMS can take this meeting forward in some way and hope to take part in some workshops Jill will be running in the Autumn. I then made my way back home. I had a long treck across London by bus with everyone talking about what had gone on. Things were brought home even more when I realised one of the failed bombs was on a tube at the Oval, which I pass through everyday to work and is not far from us in Clapham. I could well have travelled on it around that time to Liverpool street if I hadn't have decided to take a bus instead. I then saw my freind Pete from church interviewed on the news. He had been in the carriage when the rucksack exploded. It highlights how these incidents have a knock on affect which touches us all. I took this picture this morning on the way to work by car as I passed the Oval station. It seems things are still unfolding. For the latest check out the bbc website

North India Encounter

A group of young people from the Open heaven church in Loughborugh and fusion are in the air flying to North India for their Encounter experience. They are keeping a weblog of their trip on the blahonline blog and you can find out a bit about what they will be doing on this trip to India link  One of the things they will be up to is living with the Delhi brotherhood for a week and getting involved in their work in the slums in Delhi so their updates should be interesting.

BBQ for Youth leaders

Last night we made the most of the good weather and had a BBQ for all the youth leaders in our church. It was great to sit out the back and talk, drink and eat into the warm night. The only downer is cleaning up but I have felt a sense of empathy in reading Dave's Cartoon blog. He lists 10 things that need to be done after a bbq

Theological response to London bombings

Ekklesia's Simon Barrow has written a paper for a theological response to the London bombings. His article is on the CMS website and is challenges religious groups to examine their own teachings and face up to the "difficult bits" where violence is promoted. He also challenges our terminology when talking about waging a "war on terror", which speaks more of revenge than Christian Love. The challenge we all face is knowing what label belongs to who. Muslims think it's Christian's bombing Iraq, While Christians in the west see it as a secular response party due to countries turning their back on God. The US probably share both these view points! so how on earth can we really know what to think about anybody? Perhaps it's like Solomon's wisdom in descerning between the two women who claimed they both were the mother of a baby. He deemed the baby should be sawn in two and given to both women. Of course the mother couldn't accept this and so conceeded to let the other women have the baby. By this Solomon could see the Mothers love for her child and gave the baby to it's rightful Mum. So in the face of anger, fear and persecution, who of us, no matter which side of the fence we stand can forgive and so show our genetic similarity to God.

Setting Captives Free training

Hasna and Ruby performed a dialogue as trafficked women from Bangladesh to the Red light district of Pune. It was a powerful image and I am sure will have an impact at Greenbelt this year. We all experimented with making the CMS setting the captive free bracelets, which come from Bangladesh and are made of Joot. After much fiddling we got the knack of it. Big Intent will also be performing at Greenbelt using the story of Diwali as a way to hightlight the issue of women being tricked by false promises of a better life.