Greenbelt ABC - Travelling Light (3)

F - Franciscans - There on the campsite, the brown-robed First Order brothers and sisters and in the resources area where the Third Order, of whom I'm one, had their stall.  The former, and more recently members of other religious orders, have been a calming  presence at Greenbelt for many years now.

Facebook - Like Marmite again; Greenbelt has several groupings on the dreaded Facebook. I find them a mixed blessing. Great for getting practical information on the nuts 'n bolts of the festival,  to have fun, and to make new contacts. It's good to have some familiar faces to look out for once you're there on the campsite. It's useful to have a place where you can feedback post festival, too. The downside, and I guess this applies on all social media, is that arguments can get extremely intense, misunderstandings can blow up in a matter of minutes. Sometimes it's better to 'Travel light' and take a break.

G - The Grove  - A woodland, sylvan area by the lake. One of the sister venues to the one where  I was volunteering, it had a similar, contemplative vibe, with a more eco feel to it. I didn't actually get to any of the events there, though from what I saw on the programme visitors there spent much time being At One With the Soil (as indeed we all did by the time Monday's rainstorms arrived).

Glamping - At the beginning of the festival I cast many a supercilious glance across at this encampment of luxury yurts.  By the end, the thought of forking out a small fortune to have access to hot water, cooking facilities and your own private block of loos seemed  entirely justified!

H - Higgedy Pies. Mmmmmm!

Contemplative Mindmaps

I want to break with the snow theme for a moment to highlight  a reflection on comtemplative prayer that's new to me - a Contemplative Mindmap by Franciscan Tertiary Simon McMurtary as part of a series of reflections on various topics related to life as a Franciscan. Other mindmaps include Basic Rule of Life and Franciscan Principles. A helpful resource if like me, you're somebody who sometimes finds that images help them to a new understanding.

If you like this, you might also like to give this contemplative prayer exercise from Loyola Hall a go. I've found it especially helpful in the past at times when I've been feeling "blocked" or when I'm going through a "dry" spell in prayer.

Greenbelt 2012

or as it's becoming known: Greenbelt (the muddy one). How did it go for me? Well, if squelchilly [sp] Would I go back? Now I really wasn't expecting to write this a month ago but yes - against all my expectations, this year's festival, my first as a volunteer, surpassed my expectations, which, let's face it, after some less than positive experiences last year weren't exactly set high. Cut to a dialogue on  good old Shipoffools for some background -  basically, GB can be a lonely place if you're not there with a group or partner. Volunteering is a good way to alleviate at least some of this.

Yup, you've said it. This year's volunteering was a calculated risk for me; if it hadn't worked , I'd decided to take a rest from GB for a few years. Happily the outcome was positive. I'll Be Back. 

Agree that the dynamics change when you're not attached - to partner or group. (My other half no longer 'does' Greenbelt). With just one exception that I knew of, 

all my team were there either with their church or partner to go back to, although I felt quite sorry for the couples who were working different shifts in different venues and so hardly saw anything of each other all weekend!

I found that not having that ready-made network to fall back on I really needed to push myself forward more than I'd normally do and valued those brief meetings I had all the more because of that. Ironically I went straight on to our annual church pilgrimage soon after GB - four days of enforced togetherness - the two complemented each other quite nicely! 

Ok, that's got the navel-gazing out of the way, so what were my GB highlights this year? To be honest, between stewarding, helping on the TSSF stall in G Source, feeding, watering and resting, there weren't huge amounts of time left for galiavanting. I made it  to a grand total of two talks and half a Franciscan Eucharist, the Sunday morning mud-fest (open air communion) and Last Orders on the Monday evening. So, in no particular order of merit:

1. My one and only shower on Friday afternoon after two days on site. I felt A New Woman.
1b. Volunteer welcome on arrival by Tractorgirl. Great to see a friendly face.
2. Dave Tomlinson in Jerusalem on the Friday evening on How to Be a Bad Christian: and a Better Human Being. Never did get that half pint of Bad Christian though.
3. Veronica Zundel, Jo Swinney and Hazel Rolston talking about their experiences of depression and how our church communities can help, rather than hinder sufferers -  up against a background of the Iona Community's Big Sing and a wonky heater that couldn't be switched off! I reckon a copy of this talk should be compulsory listening for all church leaders and congregations.
4. Helping at the TSSF stall in G Source, even if this was more limited than previously because of my volunteer shifts. I just love the variety of people there; you never know who's going to pass by, what kind of conversation you're going to have: the mundane, the quirky and the totally unexpected. Chatting to the other stallholders: Who knew there was an Association of Christian Motorcyclists? Where else can you corner a (quite senior-looking) clergyman  and bore him with your pet peeve about Vocation Not Only Being For Those Who Are Called To Ordination? Or  have the chance to engage with Inclusive Church, PCN and Modern Church all in one place?

5. The brief meetings mentioned above: particularly the friend and her husband who offered to take me into Cheltenham to buy dry clothes after Saturday's mudbath. (Luckily I didn't need to take them up on their kind offer!) The fellow tertiary who invited me along to The Franciscans - I took shelter in their refectory during the cloudburst.
6. The volunteers' lounge: Oh the joy of having a dry, quietish place to retreat to with copious supplies of tea, coffee and biscuits!
7. The distinctly Franciscany ethos to many of  the events - even if I didn't manage to get to some of them, and others which tantalisingly took place in the venue I was stewarding in but which I wasn't able to hear properly due to noise pollution and the heavens opening: at times we wondered whether Eden should have been renamed Noah's Ark. No pics of the venue from me - only took one photo throughout the weekend - so will link readers to another blogger who did  - hello, Inverted Commas and thank you! It was a great place, and it'll be exciting to see how it develops over the next year or so.
8. The young chap who struck up a deep, theological conversation with me one evening as we struggled through the quagmire outside the Big Top. Only at Greenbelt!
9. The other venue volunteer who let me tag along with them to Last Orders on the Monday night.
10. And last, but not least - the  driver  on Tuesday morning who drove me all the way back from the gate to mainstage to collect my luggage and get me out to the car park - even as the golf carts were being called back in by taxi control. Without her, and the site steward who kept an eye on my stuff, I'd be heading to the physiotherapist by now.

So there you have it. Can't close without leaving you with another glimpse of The Mud and puddles: The Flood in G Source (thanks Banksyboy) and the err... not sure if iconic is the right word to describe it - image of Greenbelt (the muddy one) and lucky subject of last week's Church Times Caption Competition. I've been having a field day!







         

Little Portion - new TSSF magazine

For anybody who's ever wondered  what  Franciscan Tertiary (TSSF)  page  at the top of this blog refers to, I've just linked to the first issue of our province's new, colourful  magazine, Little Portion. Why Little Portion, and what's it all about anyway?

 LITTLE PORTION gets its name from Porziuncola (“little portion of land”) that was the most sacred place for the early Franciscans. It was here that the young Francis understood his vocation and embarked on his own lifelong formation and that of forming the three orders that continue to exist today. This new TSSF publication offers a ‘little portion’ of wisdom from local groups, areas and the provincial networks as a means of nurturing our members in their own personal growth as well as nourishing them in their engagement with building community both within and beyond TSSF.

                          Little Portion, Issue 1, June 2012 


 With the theme for this first issue of Prophetic Voices in our Time, I think it's  good, general reading,  whether you're of a Franciscan persuasion or none.

(And no, I'm not on commission to the editorial team, in case you wondered!)

Rule of Life - Finding a Pattern to Live By

Puffin Club Founder Members' Competition 1967

I've found it at last.    In 1967, I penned my list of rules 'to help some Puffins who had suddenly become "as clever as people" live wisely and happily,' I never guessed that 45 plus years later, I'd be chewing over my own 'rule' or 'way of life,' as a Franciscan tertiary. Those cheery little seabirds do have a habit of popping up for me, don't they? Would that I was so straightforward and uncomplicated now as I was at eight years old!  Here's what I wrote:

• Puffins should not leave their babies alone.
• Puffins should not fight at all.
• Puffins should not leave their eggs to be eaten.
• Puffins should be a little less shy.
• Puffins should be very happy all the year.
• Puffins should be as comical as they like. 
• Puffins should be very sensible.  

Makes me smile, that last one; I was such a serious, conscientious little girl.   Yet, from a quick skim down the list, I can see that even then I'd an awareness of the areas where I needed to grow; a good rule of life challenges you to streeeetch yourself to the edges of your comfort zones, and shyness, negativity and anxiety are issues all too familiar to me even now. (Not sure about the eggs bit, though!).

I wonder where the other competition winners are now and whether  any element of their 'rules' still hold true for them  in later life? 

 

Tea and cucumber sandwiches - Summer is Icumen in 3

Treated myself to a proper straw sunhat yesterday. Well,  I had to keep up appearances, didn't I, after a weekend of gracious living. Daughter came home for a flying visit, insisted on cooking for us: a great chicken, feta and blueberry salad on Friday evening, barbecue on Saturday, Eurovision Song Contest and a box of chocolates in the evening, (Three cheers for the Russian Grannies!). Another high spot  - we took ourselves out for tea and cakes at our favourite cafe by the canal where I'd been with  our TSSF small group only the previous Saturday. Sunshine, real china, good company and the chance to sit in the sunshine watching the swans and ducks drift by. Wonderful. 

Being a glutton for punishment, daughter and her cronies went back to the teashop for yet another tea drinking session at Saturday breakfast time. 

One day I will start that teashop blog.

Falling Upward

                                            Interview with Richard Rohr OFM about his book Falling Upward

‘[T]he task of the first half of life is to create a proper container for one’s live and answer the first essential questions: “What makes me significant?” “How can I support myself”? and “Who will go with me?” The task of the second half of life is, quite simply, to find the actual contents that this container was meant to hold and deliver… In other words, the container is not an end in itself, but exists for the sake of your deeper and fullest life, which you largely do not know about yourself! Far too many people just keep doing repair work on the container itself and never “throw their nets into the deep” to bring in the huge catch that awaits them’…” 

  - From Falling Upward: A Spirituality for the Two Halves of Life

Much to get my head round at the moment; not easy when said head is still recovering from  the riches of our Rome visit. There was a lot to take in for all of us in our joint TSSF Area meeting yesterday, with a challenging talk and discussion on 'Adult Spirituality,' or, to be more exact 'Spirituality in the Second Half of Life,' by one of the contributors to the recent Chronicle magazine on faith journeying.  When are we ever not on a journey? We're always in process,  a work in progress I guess. I know my own personal 'inner landscape' has had its fair share of twists and turns; not all ones I'd have chosen either. But looking back over the ground I've covered these last many years, I now realise that one of the most significant concepts I've had to let go of is the assumption that all progress is linear. The image of the spiral is one I've found helpful. You can tell I'm a fan of TS Eliot, can't you?

Yesterday's speaker used several popular models which aim to  draw together knowledge of life and faith stages to offer us helpful ways in which we can try to understand our own and other's journeys: mainly those of Richard Rohr and, one which was new to me, the model outlined in Hagberg and Guelich's Critical Journey.  Another one mentioned, that of  Alan Jamieson's  Chrysalis I'm more familiar with and is my favourite, maybe because I'm increasingly finding myself respond more to visual imagery as I get older.  This isn't unusual, apparently a renewed, (or even a new) discovery of personal creativity is common to the second half of life.

Either way, I've found some of these ideas  invaluable as my life's grown and changed, especially when  I struggled with the church as an institution, it's been like a lifeline for me to know that where I was  wasn't all there is ; the pastures of Christianity are far wider and greener than the field I happen to be in.  Neither does it do anybody harm to realise that the way of living of the cows across in the neighbouring ones are as valid as those of your own, however exasperating you may find them!

To return to TSSF - or indeed any religious grouping or community, the challenge is maybe, to reflect on we can prayerfully use tools like these (and they are tools, not the be all and end all) to resource and support each other wherever we happen to be in our Christian walk. Useful to reflect too, that just as individuals grow and change, so institutions and religious orders too, mature and change.   Though the message and ethos of our founder is timeless, the way in which we live that out in response to society and culture we find ourselves merits  a re-think.

A challenging day...

When in Rome...

...do remember to take an umbrella with you.  A soaking wet and bronchitic Greenpatch's view of the queue for the Vatican museums earlier in the week.  How does I went to the Vatican and all I got was a wodge of  loo roll sound as a T shirt slogan? Whilst I wouldn't say my time spent  hacking into the papally provided toilet tissue and downing  my Bronchenolo Sedativo e Fluidificante rated up there with visiting the Sistine Chapel, it came pretty close! Both of us went down with the lurgy although happily it didn't spoil our stay in Rome; we managed to pack a fair amount into the four days we were there, thanks in part to some handy hints and tips from a fellow TSSF tertiary, (you know who you are!) A million thanks.

More later perhaps. We got in at 1 am this morning  after a fourteen hour journey and are still trying to come down to earth.

Good Samaritans - Street Pastors

                                                             - Street pastors on patrol


We were put in mind of the parable of the Good Samaritans today during our TSSF small group meeting. One of our tertiaries told us a little about his role as a member  of his local area Street Pastors team. This initiative  has  spread all over the UK; the town where I'm based is due to launch the scheme at the end of this month. So - what is a Street Pastor? Well, to quote the Street Pastor UK site:

A Street Pastor is a Church leader/minister or member with a concern for society - in particular young people who feel themselves to be excluded and marginalised - and who is willing to engage people where they are, in terms of their thinking (i.e. their perspective of life) and location (i.e. where they hang out - be it on the streets, in the pubs and clubs or at parties etc). 

Street Pastors will also be willing to work with fellow activists, church and community leaders, and with agencies and projects, both statutory and voluntary, to look at collaborative ways of working on issues affecting youth, and initiatives that will build trust between them and the Street Pastors.

As the Street Pastor gets to know people in the community he/she will find out their needs are and what can be done to help. A presence of Street Pastors will earn credibility in the community, so that people know that the Church is there for them in a practical way. The role is not about preaching heaven and hell, but one of listening, caring and helping - working in an unconditional way.

Listening, caring and helping - working in an unconditional way; sounds very familiar and so Franciscan. It doesn't surprise me one bit that our fellow tertiary feels called to take on this role.  As mum to two adult, but still young people it's reassuring to know that the Street Pastors are out there. Our place isn't exactly the inner city either, but it so needs its good samaritans.  The town centre is a pretty scarey place at nights; over the years I've picked up on stuff from my two that would make your hair curl. And this is just  what they've told me about...

With all the debate recently about the  marginalisation of Christianity in public life, it's great to see a Christian-based initiative that's presenting a positive image and that truly seems to be accepted and appreciated by wider society. It seems that there've been reports of a drop in crime rates in many of the areas which have taken on the SP scheme. It's going to be very interesting to see how it fares in our neck of the woods.