Long, long ago when I was a rookie engineer and computers were mainframes and it cost around £1k a go to run a scientific programme, all our reports were hand written, checked by the boss and then sent to the Document Production Department where a dedicated person typed them into a primitive, DOS-based word processor guaranteeing conformity to house style, a trained draughtsperson turned your diagrams into things of beauty, and an editor made sure that the whole thing was correctly ordered and presented.  By the time you got it back -about week later - barring the odd minor error that had been missed or arose due to bad handwriting, it was ready to go.

Then came personal computers and people who did not know what they were doing started to type their own reports.  Properly set up indents gave way to clumsy use of the space bar and tab key.  People did not know that you are meant to leave TWO spaces after a fullstop before the next sentence (unless you work for Boeing then it's three).  Ham-fisted efforts to use the drawing tools saw ugly diagrams, and as for a house style, well forget it!

So along came Electronic Document Management systems resplendent with templates and macros, produced by very clever computer boffins but never quite doing what you needed them to, never quite flexible enough for what you had in mind.  House style was back, and CAD progammes improved the diagrams, but even so, all was not as it once was.  Wise employers retained some of their specialist document production staff (i.e. typists and editors) to tidy up the documents and work with the boffins to improve the software.

And then someone realised they were on to something good here, and, lo, came software that combined databasing, document templates and the macros to link them together.  And the scope was endless and a single programme could, well nearly, do the job for engineers, scientists, historians and theologians - just so long as they knew which template was the closest to what they needed and were willing/able to tidy it up before publication

Chicago 15th A is a tolerable template!  (Thank you nice kind supervisor for pointing me towards it) It nearly does what I need it to do.  All the frustrations with 'nearly' software I thought I'd escaped from continue.  Yes, it is quicker and more accurate than typing it all in myself, and when I get to large numbers of references and enormous bibliographies I'll be glad of it.  But progess?  I'm not entriely convinced!

I have been working on my sermon on 'An Inclusive Community' and decided to supplement the suggested reading of the call of Levi from Mark 2 with the story of Zaccheus from Luke 19.  It is Zaccheus who has proved more helpful as I think I can justify identifying different aspects of exclusion, and hence inclusion...

1. He was physically excluded (altogether: 'Now Zaccheus was a very little man...')
2. He was socially excluded - he was a Roman collaborator
3. He was religiously excluded - he was a 'sinner'

This is handy because it allows me to look at different ways we, inadvertently or otherwise, exclude people from our communities of faith and some of the tough questions that arise.

• For example - we have a very word-based visual culture, so what of those who cannot see, those who cannot read English and those who cannot read at all?
• For example - who are the people /people groups we don't like on principle?
• For example - if we define certain lifestyles as 'sinful,' who are we excluding?

We then get questions, for example, about

• How to avoid 'trying to please everyone' and ending up 'offending everyone equally' in worship
• How do strike a balance between 'legalism' and 'laissez faire' attitudes on complex moral dilemmas

Part of my aim, I have to admit, is to try to nudge people beyond their Sunday School answers and to start engaging with some real questions.  Alongside the sermons I am producing home study material which will be quite demanding but, I hope, adequately accessible.  It is tricky trying to stretch those who have had a university education, encourage those who left school at 14 and avoid either getting sacked or frightening people.  But it is fun trying.

Oh, and if Jesus went to Zaccheus' house for tea, as the song says, did he have his fruit and cream before or after his cake?  This seems to be a north/south divide issue... answers on a postcard to the usual address

Yesterday D+1 joined us for worship, and we had a good turnout.  In fact, I know that there were 43 people present because we had 40 communion glasses!  Due to various mishaps over the last two years and the fact that it seems someone likes these things enough to pinch the odd one now and then (either that or they grow legs and walk), forty appears to be the sum total.

Yesterday there was enough wine for 40 glasses, so I was offered some blackcurrant squash for the chalice - aside from any litrugical or theological preferences, I do NOT like blackcurrant drinks; indeed it is well known in certain circles that if I drink it, I must be VERY thirsty.  Still, I point blank refuse to lift an empty chalice, so blackcurrant squash it was.

Just as well, as it turned out - the two servers and I had to share the common cup while eveyone else had their nice, almost sterile glass of sickly sweet communion wine.

I think the absurdity was lost on most people, but my servers - who had taken a equal part to me in the communion liturgy anyway (apologies those who don't like 'con-celebration' or the like) - seemed to quite appreciate the greater intimacy it offered.

One step nearer to a common cup?  Anyone got a sledge hammer for the remaining 40 glasses?!

I have begun reading the Archbishop's lent book for 2007 and so far, it is great.  Challenging, thoughtful and original -at least compared to other stuff I've read, maybe less so if you read a lot of Ched Myers or Stanley Hauerwas.

So far I have read a chapter that outlines the relationship of first century Judea to Rome and examines the gospel portraits of Pilate and another that looks at reform and revolution with Judaism before looking at Barabbas.  Each chapter ends with 'wonderings' that gently prompt the reader to repsond to themself and a prayer.

Definitely a refreshing and thought provoking read.

OK, so I've been a post-a-holic today, but I have written a few thousand words of my draft essay on historical methods and the place of historical resources in theological reflection.  Apologies to those who will have to read it, my 2-3k words now looks more like 7-8k, but it does do a bit more than simply describe various approaches.

Two things went 'ping' in my brain today - that's pretty impressive for a Saturday.

1)  Where does/should the 'God element fit in the histories that churches/denominations (or even faiths) write?  Seemingly, in ordinary history, this went out with Elizabeth I or thereabouts; it feels as if in Christian history it went out with the Gospel writers.  That is probably unfair, the sacred/secular divide is also probably an Enlightenment thing (but I haven't read about that (yet)).  Either way, the Baptist history I read never mentions God, and I find myself asking 'why not'? Is this good or bad?  If so, why? Or why not? (See, I'm learning to do this thing called 'problematising', either that or I've reached the 'why' phase forty years too late!)

2) Assuming historical resources are a valid input to theological reflection - which I assert they are - what is their status?  If we assert the primacy of scripture (or Jesus Christ if you're a proper Baptist, but then he's 'as revealed in Scripture' so in practical terms it's roughly the same thing) over tradition, where do historical resources fit in the hierarchy?  I raise this question in my essay thus... higher or lower than creeds and doctrinal statements?  Above or below  the Anti-Nicene Fathers, Calvin and Charles Haddon Spurgeon?  OK, so I'm being a bit flippant, my speciality, but I think it's a fair question.  We all have some kind of unwritten hierarchy of authority, but who decides and how is it judged?  Methodism, so I understand, has a threefold set of Scripture-Tradition-Reason, presumably in that order; any form of theological reflection necessarily fits experience in somewhere.  But do we ever try to expand on what we mean by these things?  Is it a given that Tertullian must carry more weight than Doddridge, say?  Is Spurgeon more 'authoritative,' at least for Baptists, than Wesley or Clifford or Temple?  And who decides and how?

Well, I don't have any answers, but I've had a fun day typing and pondering.  I have not a clue if what I've written is up to the required standard (and the format needs loads of work I'm sure, not least as I have't yet worked how to tell the software to do what I want it to) but I am enjoying myself and that, surely, is the key.