I dream of a church...

I dream of a church that joins in with God's laughing

as she rocks in her rapture enjoying her art:

she's glad of her world, in its risking and growing:

'tis the child she has borne and holds close to her heart.

I dream of a church that joins in with God's weeping

as she crouches, weighed down by the sorrow she sees:

she cries for the hostile, the cold and no hoping,

for she bears in herself our despair and disease.

I dream of a church that joins in with God's dancing

as she moves like the wind and the wave and the fire:

a church that can pick up its skirts, pirouetting,

with the steps that can signal God's deepest desire.

I dream of a church that joins in with God's loving

as she bends to embrace the unlovely and lost,

a church that can free, by its sharing and daring,

the imprisoned and poor, and then shoulder the cost.

God, make us a church that joins in with your living,

as you cherish and challenge, rein in and release,

a church that is winsome, impassioned, inspiring:

lioness of your justice, and lamb of your peace.

(by Kate Compston)

Do you dream of a church like this? If you do, if you dream of a church in Cardiff that is progressive, pluralist, mystical, charismatic, queer, feminist, and rooted in Jesus' vision of justice then please get in touch with me.

I would love to plant a new church like that with you.

Comments

Drop the Free Christian!

Let me preface what I'm going to say by first saying this: I am a Christian. It's taken me a long time to be able to say that, and to know what I mean by that, and I'm very lucky that in the Unitarian church I have been given the space to come to that decision in my own time, on my own terms. But I am a Christian, I'm more Christian now than I have been for years. Now: I want us to drop this "Free Christian" from our title. It's a silly phrase that we need to get rid of. Why? "The General Assembly of Unitarian and Free Christian Churches" is a long and unwieldy title. It would be much better if we traded under something like "Unitarians in Britain." It gives the impression that there are two separate and distinct groups: "Unitarians" and "Free Christians," this is not the case. It's not that there are Unitarians (who are not Christians) and "Free Christians" who are not Unitarians. There are not two dif...

Clergy-wear during protests

OK, I'm wandering into the territory of Beauty Tips for Ministers here, but a couple of recent conversations have brought up the issue of what clergy should wear for protests. I know a number of Ministers who only wear clerical collars for protests. The logic is that it's important to identify as a Minister when you're supporting something society doesn't expect clergy to. So Ministers will wear a collar at gay prides or pro-choice rallies to make this point. Now I could understand this if it you wore a collar going about your general business, and also did during a protest, but I'm quite uncomfortable with the idea of wearing clerical wear ONLY for protests. The seems to be something worth exploring. I have said before that I'm not in favour of special titles or clothing for religious leadership, mainly because Jesus explicitly said this was a lot of nonsense. Religious leaders should not need these articial crutches. I have no problem with certain liturgical c...

Is humanism theologically tolerant?

OK, well this might be controversial, but I feel the need to say it. Is humanist tolerant? Please note I'm not asking about humanism within society. Clearly humanism certainly believes in tolerance within society and I'm forever glad they are often the only people in the media calling for a separation of church and state. No, what I'm talking about is descriptions of Unitarianism like this and adverts like this , discussed at Peacebang here , which say that humanism is one option, Christianity is another, God is one option among many. The trouble is, humanism, by definition is theologically opposed to theism. This is very different from the relationship between Christianity and Buddhism. These two traditions may be vastly different, but Buddhism, by definition , is not opposed to Christianity, and Christianity, by definition , is not opposed to Buddhism. But humanism is consciously defined in opposition to Christianity and theism. So to say that humanism and theism can bot...

Reignite

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