Virtually friends

I'm not good at keeping up with Facebook but having put up the Christmas tree, survived the supermarket and sorted out my home group for January I decided to skim through my home page. What an amazing bunch of friends I have!

Justin is 'as happy as a 4 year old' walking and rolling in the snow (good picture!), Stephen thinks cheese graters are pretty sharp on the fingers (which leaves me wondering what he does with grated cheese as 11.00pm.), Bindy just posted three great pictures of snow on the river Lot just outside their front door (in France), Geoff had his flight from Chicago to NYC cancelled and is waiting to be rescheduled, and Jill 'loves her job' - but I have forgotten what she does!

The strange thing is I've emailed several friends in different parts of the world today, read my Facebook and prayed for two very speciual people who I haven't seen in ages - but I haven't seen my neighbours all day and I'm not even sure I know whether Alice (in the house opposite mine) is at home right now or back in hospital. I have great friends here in Oxford, and good neighbours too, but my friends out there in cyberspace are important too. How do you define friendship? What is Jill's job?

13,589,257

That's how many people had signed the Avaaz petition to world leaders gathered in Copenhagen when I last checked their website earlier this evening. I'm not sure whether that gets them a world record for the largest petition ever but I do know its a lot of people - more than voted for the X-Factor winner! But that's just as it should be, after all the future of our planet is slightly more important that Joe McElderry's singing career.

The petition says, "We call on each of you to make the necessary concessions to meet your historic responsibilities in this crisis. Rich countries must offer fair funding, and all countries must set ambitious targets on emissions. Do not leave Copenhagen without a fair, ambitious and binding deal that keeps the world safe from catastrophic global warming of 2 degrees."

When I logged on to sign I was struck by the single word 'concessions'. In fact it almost stopped me signing. My struggle with the c-word is that it implies that I have a right to burn as much fossil fuel as I like and fill the sky with CO2 but, 'as a concession' to some suffering people in Bangladesh or somewhere I will make a generous gesture and reduce my emissions a little. But this is not about generosity, its about responsibility, and for Christians its about stewardship. However, I'm not naive enough not to realise that the world of politics, especially international politics, is all about concessions and compromises. So for the sake of a result I was prepared to ask our leaders for concessions ... but in my heart I really hope we might see a little more responsibility and even stewarship of God's wonderful creation.

The Bishop and the Taliban

What a gift for the Daily Telegraph - a bishop, indeed the Church of England bishop for the Armed Forces - who is caught praising the Taliban for their faith and sense of layalty to each other. In fact the paper made so much of the story on Monday that Bishop Stephen Venner was forced to appear on the BCC apologising, recanting and musing whether his indiscretion might cost him his job. Of course what bishops should say is that Taliban are bad guys and British soldiers are good guys, full stop.

Bishop Stephen's real sin was, of course, to completely underestimate the British press who are convinced that none of its readers have any capacity to deal with shades of grey, subtlety or nuance. For that he is guilty. His sin appears even worse when two days later we read of more bombings in Pakistan and another 22 innocent people dead in Dera Ghazi Khan.

But if the Telegraph will only let the man speak then he might have a point to make which could challenge our simplistic thinking and help us to engage with the real forces behind terrorism. He speaks of course about the power of faith (not just religious faith?) to motivate and empower people as well as the significance of 'community', 'commradeship' or (to use a churchy word) 'fellowship'. Without in any way approving the object of Taliban faith or its outworkings in violent action we can, nevertheless allow our reflection on their faith and brotherhood to challenge the depth of our own faith in God and the community we find (or don't find) within the Christian church.

Now that Bishop Stephen has apologised for his naivity perhaps the Telegraph might like to apologise for its treatment of its readers as simpletons - unable to even begin thinking about this highly complex human conflict of convictions.

The Professor and the Bishop

For almost fifteen years now I have been meeting with a small group of 'fellow pilgrims' with whom I once sent a month living in Windsor Castle. That was a very special month - a wonderful warm English summer, royalty as neighbours, the historic St George's chapel and its choir to aid worship and six great colleagues to work and reflect with. We met again a few weeks ago and as a reward for organising our meeting place (alas not Windsor Castle this time!) I received a book by one of our number.

Taproots for Transformation by Prof. Richard Whitfield is not the sort of book I would naturally read but as it was written and gifted by a friend a have been exploring its pages, or perhaps I should say 'joining in its conversation'. The book takes the form of a 200 page conversation between Richard (a professor of education passionate about child development and adult nurture) and Bruce Gilberd (the retired bishop of Auckland, New Zealand). As Christmas approaches I quote one short passage - from Richard:

"The baby born at Bethlehem, whose parents ensure that he avoids Herod's jealous infanticide, who, from a carpenter's apprenticeship, becomes the radical teacher and healer, and who dies unjustly, with his integrity intact, with two thieves on a Calvary cross changes how we might view each other. ... Everyone counts, and profoundly. ... Now we must avoid [all human] dereliction in the future by letting deep spiritual taproots source humanitity's transformation, in which 'religion' as such is clearly a very mixed blessing." If you want to read more you can find the book here.