[ hold :: this space ]

i started writing this in Hong Kong sometime yesterday… i’ve been home for 18 hours, asleep for not quite enough of them, and hope this doesn’t reflect that!… i intended to write a lot more while i was away, but barely touched the computer… no regrets there…

We had a good trip. Greenbelt was followed by a few days in Telford, then the group split with mine going to Belfast and Manchester, before rejoining the others [who had been in Oxford] in London for a couple of days. The time always goes so fast, and the conversations just seem to get started; at its best, the trip gives a taste, and it sparks some imagination.

The entire trip is made possible only by the amazing generosity and hospitality of the people and communities we visit. I think in future trips we need to think about how we minimise the burden for those we visit - it must be getting to a point where many of them are spending more time entertaining fact-finding visitors than they are being community … i also think there are a number of communities who carry the cost of public scrutiny and opinions that are arrogantly formed in a fleeting visit. It’s easy to speak of them theoretically, rather than as people trying to make sense of the hardest parts of their lives and faith in a public space. Needless to say, each group we connected with was remarkable - not just for the fabulous things they are doing, but for their honesty and integrity in who they are trying to become.

Over the last few days Nic and i were talking through possibilities for next year’s trip. we need to split the group into two again - one focussed on meeting with people in new forms of faith community, the other focussed on meeting with those who are working to make space for such communities in the institutional church. I think i’d like to go one step further with the first group though, and offer a trip for people who want to explore the connection between culture and spirituality, not necessarily for any outworking in a faith community context, and certainly not necessarily as potential ‘leaders’ of such communities… it would be great to take some of the artists [in the broadest definition] who are right on the fringes of what we’re doing here [which is, in its turn, on the fringe of the church] to visit greenbelt, then to meet with groups and people in the UK [christian and otherwise] who are making the same connections on a day to day basis… it would be the kind of trip where we’d spend as much time in galleries as we would with communities…

so a huge thankyou to those who met with us, brought us into their homes [and their pubs]… and to our UK support crew [especially Taryn!] who offered local knowledge and wisdom that makes logistics so much easier… And thanks to the group who put up with a fairly relentless schedule with great humour, and managed to turn even the dodgiest moments into some kind of learning experience…

the annual UK trip has functioned as a punctuation mark for me over the last few years - a semicolon of sorts. some theme always gets expanded in its aftermath, things take on a new direction in response. i’m looking forward to seeing what that might be this year… but it’s going to have to unfold in my subconscious for a few days; i’m taking most of the next week off… see you on return.

I keep trying to get a moment to blog - i’ve been trying for the last three weeks - but it’s quite busy at the moment! I’ve made a deliberate attempt to leave the computer off wherever possible, and blogging is paying the cost of that! but we’re in Stratford-upon-Avon, post Greenbelt, having 24 hours recovery, and i’ve got 5 minutes before checkout time…

Greenbelt was fabulous, as always. it was a really busy greenbelt - i was involved in a lot of stuff, as well as trying to make greenbelt possible for the group… the mud and cold made some of that a little trickier… but it was really wonderful to catch up with the people who hold space for me… more about that and them later.

We curated worship on Saturday afternoon. It was a little risky, we build the worship around very australian imagery and it was hard to predict how easy that would be for people to enter into. I think it went OK. I’ll put up what we did as soon as I can.

I’ve got better at doing Greenbelt - I’m less and less interested in hearing people speak, and more looking for the possibilities of conversations with people in similar spaces to me… i was thinking about things i’d like to do next year: i’d like to be involved in a couple more roundtables - one with women in leadership [laura, cary, nadia, jen, etc], not to talk about being women in leadership, but just to talk about leadership… the other thing i’d like to be involved with is a conversation about prison stuff, which is something a number of people talked to me about on the weekend. i’m imagining these would be things that are less ‘panel’ like, and more conversation amongst the group.

Anyway, we’re on to Telford today to meet with Mark Berry and the community there. Our group is a really interesting mix of people [as are most groups!]. it will be interesting to see how our conversation unfolds, what the focus will be: how things fit within the ‘institution’, or how communities work…

i’ll write more whenever we have access again - about worship, and also about the prison stuff down in Exeter and Channings Wood last week.

We’re putting the final touches on this year’s trip to the UK. 15 of us from Australia are heading over for Greenbelt, and then visiting a few different alt / emerging communities through the UK. I’m arriving a little early to catch up with some people who work in prisons in the UK before the rest of the group arrive. We’ll be joined by another 10 or 15 australians [and ex-pats] at greenbelt - we’ll all be camping together.

We are curating worship on Saturday at 5pm in the New Forms cafe. The theme is ‘the memory of water’.

[we already have strong interest for next year's trip... i'll be putting out information about that hopefully before we leave for this year's...]

Nic, from NSW, and I have been meeting over the last couple of days to plan the greenbelt trip. We have 16 people travelling this year, which has led us to split part of the trip into two groups - the group that Nic’s coordinating will be more focussed on meeting with people who work with the ‘institution’ to see how they create space for alternative forms of christian community within their denomination. i’m coordinating the other group which will be focussed solely on visiting communities around the UK to hear their stories.

there’s no more space left in the group… and there are even a number of people who have said they can’t come this year, but would love to be part of a trip next year. we’re really delighted that so many people from such diverse perspectives want to be part of these trips. they’re building a critical mass of people who ‘get’ the conversation.

[photos by mike]

we’re off to greenbelt again.

If you’re interested in coming to the UK in August - September, to go to Greenbelt and then meet people from alternative / emerging communities around the UK, flick me an email. I’ll send you details of the trip we’re planning, and how you can be part of it.

This trip is a collaboration between a few of us around australia… our aim with these visits is to build a critical mass of people who are talking the same language and speaking from a shared experience. We want to offer people a taste of what’s possible, to inspire imagination… and as those who went last year would testify, it can be a remarkable, life-changing experience.