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A Skinny Fairtrade Latte in the Food Court of Life - Page 670

  • For Fun

    Trawling around cyberspace, I found this which made me chuckle...

    A well-known proverb states: an optimistic would say a glass is half full, while a pessimist would say it is half empty. What would people of different professions and walks of life say?

    The government would say that the glass is fuller than if the opposition party were in power.

    The opposition would say that it is irrelevant because the present administration has changed the way such volume statistics are collected.

    The philosopher would say that, if the glass was in the forest and no one was there to see it, would it be half anything?

    The economist would say that, in real terms, the glass is 25% fuller than at the same time last year.

    The banker would say that the glass has just under 50% of its net worth in liquid assets.

    The psychiatrist would ask, "What did your mother say about the glass?"

    The physicist would say that the volume of this cylinder is divided into two equal parts; one a colorless, odorless liquid, the other a colorless, odorless gas. Thus the cylinder is neither full nor empty. Rather, each half of the cylinder is full, one with a gas, one with a liquid.

    The seasoned drinker would say that the glass doesn''t have enough ice in it.

     

    Enjoy!

  • Sermons with Minds of their Own

    Unusually, I have just finished preparing my sermon for tomorrow - to have done so with less than 24 hours until delivery is, for me, extremely rare.  There are many reasons for this, some are purely practical, but mostly it's becuase this one seems to have a mind of its own.  When I began preparing I had a clear idea in mind of where I wanted to go... but I ended up somewhere utterly different.  What I thought I wanted to talk about was inter-generational relationships within western-European-style families; what I ended up with is something about re-envisioning church along the lines of a roughly Afrcian philospophy of extended family.

    Last week's sermon, over which I sweated and toiled, was one I ended up quite pleased with.  This week's I'm far less confident about.  I'm happy enough with what it says, just not quite sure that it necessarily does quite what it needs to.  Ah well.  This time tomorrow I will know better how it has been received.

    It has been interesting to prepare, I have certinaly enjoyed the 'research' and study involved, I just hope that through it we detect something of God's voice.

  • Blogging "Vicars"

    A couple of links from today's BUGB e-news sweep.  Should minister-types blog or not?  Is it wise or foolish?  Is it safe or dangerous?  Why do I blog and why do you read it?

    Have a look here and here and see what you think.

    Whilst I think that as a blogger and as a minister I have clear responsibilities, I would hope that I find a reasonable balance of honesty and integrity, openness towards, and mindfulness, of others, as well as sharing stuff that now and then might make my readers pause for thought, encourage them, or just give them a good laugh.

  • The World is Small

    Next week it is the Baptist Assembly in Scotland - which means I'll be over in Dunfermline for three and a half days and probably offline (I may top up my mobile broadband, haven't yet decided).  It is also the October half term for most parts of England, though not all.  So what?  Well this week I've had emails from two lots of folk I know asking to meet up during that week.  A minister friend because his children are participating in leading worship at the Assembly (I'm really looking forward to that bit as I missed the equivalent for BUGB in May) a former colleague because he is visiting relatives in Edinburgh.  The really 'small world' bit is that the second family have booked to stay at the exact same place I will be staying, so we not only get to meet up but to have no worries about where.  The world is tiny.

    Yesterday I had a fun - if surprisingly tiring - day doing the filming with Libby.  Apart from trying to persuade Holly Cat to be filmed (which we eventually managed) it all went pretty well, and hopefully Libby has some usable quotes and good footage.  The only hitch we had was severe disruption to local trains which meant abandoning overground in favour of subway at one point, which lost us some time.  Anyway, the small world thing is that her mother grew up and went to school on Northampton, not exactly a million miles from where I did.

    In a weird kind of a way, I find a connection between this and one of the concepts I am exploring on Sunday - an African understanding of family.  Recognising our interconnectedness and interdependence ought to impact our attitudes and actions...

  • Anabaptists and Baptists

    Spotted this on Matt Stone's blog today and thought it was interesting/useful.  Lots of similarity between Anabaptists and Baptists, unsurprsingly, but also some differences.  See what you think.

    (From Palmer Becker's "What is an Anabaptist Christian"; you can see the original in text form here)

    (Tried  pasting it in but the formatting went skew-whiff)