I have just been reading over some information on the people who make up the committees and groups at church, and it is really encouraging because there are over 50 names listed - a good proportion of those who are in membership or attend regularly.  When I was a student in Manchester, I knew a retired minister who told me had always had a policy of giving people little jobs to do in church as soon as they'd settled into a pattern of regular attendance.  His theory was that if people had a reason to be at church then (a) they'd be there (b) they'd feel needed/valued and (c) they would come to take appropriate pride in the church.  Over the years I have come to see a lot of sense in this philosophy, though it isn't entirely foolproof.  Sometimes people need church to be a safe enough space to slip in and slip out again; sometimes the battering they have taken in life means they need time to recover before taking on responsibility; sometimes people are just passing through on their way somewhere else.  Participation is excellent and essential, dare I say it, Biblical, but it needs to be handled sensitively and I for one don't always find the right balance.  The reality is that in many/most churches a very small proportion of the people do a very large share of the work.  Even so, already I am enjoying being part of a church where lots of people do a little bit, which saves me one line of preaching; I just need to spot the opportunities for those who don't yet have 'a little job' !!

Last night I watched BBCs Question Time - well I expect one heck of a lot of people did - and then part of the programme following it (This Week) which discussed to some degree the rights and wrongs of what had gone on.

Jim has some helpful thoughts on the programme here which are well worth reading and pondering.

It's a really tricky one isn't it, balancing freedom of conscience and expression (something Baptists love to assert is part of our heritage) with responsibility; how to permit diversity without allowing bigotry or prejudice to go unchecked.  Someone where in all of this the creative tensions of being Gospel People seems to emerge: the call to be inclusive (welcoming the stranger and not demonising the 'other') whilst prophetically challenging that which is wrong, sinful, evil.

The BBC is, I think, quite probably right in prompting the debate its actions have prompted, but that doesn't mean we should simply accept what was broadcast without asking many, many questions.  Too easily we blame the government or the BBC for what has happened and shrug off our own responsibilities.  At the same time it is too simplistic just to say, as some did yesterday, well you voted for them, you caused the situation to which you now object.  Has this programme given extremist parties publicity they may crave? Has it created an minority underdog being beaten up by the mainstream majority?  How much of the inherent bias of this so-called impartiality have we noticed?  It is very tricky, and this virtual 'thinking aloud' is not making it any less so.  Questions about the responsibilities that accompany freedom do need to be wrestled with.  I don't have any answers, I just recall that Jesus told us to love our enemies and pray for those who hate us.

Who is it we demonise in all of this?

What are our own sins of omission or complicity?

How do I abuse my freedom?

On us, and on those we find offensive:

Lord have mercy

Christ have mercy

Lord have mercy

ASBO Jesus offers this image of church:

So what do you reckon?

Is church a demanding whirl of endless activities from which there is no escape?

Is it something where we can stand and watch others beign whirled round endlessly while we choose to opt out of getting involved?

Do we get spun round so hard we fly off and land up splatted on the ground?

Is church all the fun of the fair?

Is it all of the above?

How do we find the balance?

Just for information...

If you know where I now minister, you can access recordings of our services online via our website.

Not much posting this week - I have a few meetings and then, next week, will be at Baptist Assembly (Scotland) and am looking forward to discovering this expression of Baptistness.

Regular readers of this blog know that my maternal grandmother was Jewish (which means that I am racially Jewish, just) and may know that my grandparents moved to Glasgow at the start of World War 2 to be further from Hitler's reach because even though she had 'married out' her entire family would have been on his hit-list for extermination.  My grandparents, via a convoluted route no doubt, spent most of their lives as active Christian Scientists (often defined as the classic misnomer being neither orthodoxly Christian nor scientific; but who am I to judge?) and were for many years caretakers at their local church in Glasgow.  Yesterday I tracked it down, only to discover that it is now a Hindu centre and their former caretaker's flat a suite of offices.  It all seemed quite curious and somehow quite fitting given their own history.

So if you ever wondered why I am quite the heretic I am, maybe it is simply in my genes...?!