Learning to Walk

the last 8 days

In the last 8 days we have travelled down to London where we spent a very enjoyable Christmas with YKW's family.  Then, on Thursday, we travelled up to my parents.  We will be flying back up to Glasgow on Wednesday.

London was great; amongst other things we had an early Christmas present of afternoon tea at a very posh hotel, we visited 'The First Emperor: China's Terracotta Army' at The British Museum, and we had a meal at one of the loveliest steak restaurants that I have been to in the UK.  Since coming up here we have done some shopping in the sales, we've had all 3 brothers with all 3 female companions plus Mum and Dad in the same place for the first time in ages, and today it's my grandparent's 57th wedding anniversary for which I cooked a meal.

So a pretty full schedule and I'm looking forward to a couple more days relaxing and beginning to get my head back into gear for the work that I need to get on with as soon as we hit the ground in Glasgow.  But it will be good to get back and there's lots to look forward to getting on with.

going away

We are going down to London tomorrow morning - getting picked up by a taxi at 5.30am, and flying at 7am.  We are spending 5 nights in Blackheath near to where YKW's sister and her boyfriend live and are then traveling up to Coventry by train to see my folks for New Year.

It'll be nice to get away and to see some family and friends who we don't get to see so often.  It should also be a great chance to spend some time together as it has been a busy few weeks in the run up to the end of our work and college terms.

awards

Thanks to a tip from a friend I found the perfume for YKW's mum.  Son-in-law of the year award for me...

doh!

I went into John Lewis yesterday to buy some perfume for my mother-in-law only to find that it has been discontinued.  The question now is what shall I do; Will I ask her what she wants instead, or be brave and try and decide all by myself?!

up all night

I was up all night on Friday, but unfortunately not with the many people who are really starting to get into the Christmas mood (apparently Friday was the big night for office parties.)  Instead I found myself kneeling over the toilet being violently ill.  It is the first time since I was a child that I have been so ill and it was horrid.  It was even more upsetting because I had really been looking forward to this weekend - as it was everything on Saturday had to be cancelled but I did make it out for the carol service last night.  After the service I thought I was better so went home and had a proper dinner but, whilst dinner stayed down, I am feeling pretty rough again this morning.  However, I need to get back in the swing of thing as I have a meeting with two of our group leaders this afternoon and am visiting another group tomorrow night.

inviting

It is the carol service at St Silas this Sunday evening at 8pm and at this time of year church members go out into the local area and give postcard invitations to every home.  Tonight, at rush hour, 4 of us went and handed out invites in two of the busiest thoroughfares in the West End.  It went really well - we had some good chats with a few people, a few more people seemed incredibly grateful when they heard where we were from, and in all we handed out several hundred invites.  It is something that we will definitely be building on in the future.

results day

Today was results day and so, after the initial disappointment of finding out that 2 of my results won't be in until next term, I nervously made my way to the Christology feedback, and... I aced it.  I got 17 which is a really good mark (20 is the highest but you can't figure out a percentage just by multiplying by 5 - I'm not quite sure how it all works really!)  In my children's work I only got 14, which is below my average but is fairly respectable for my first time doing a class in this area.  The lecturer told me that I wrote very well which was not only nice but has got me thinking about the book again...

Then tonight we had the Small Group Pastors over for dinner.  I cooked roast beef and (almost) all the trimmings for the 8 of us.  It was a great evening of spending time together socially and putting our heads together over this area of church life which we all believe is so vital.

slowing down...

Aye right!  You might think that having handed in my final piece of work I would be having a bit of a rest.  And maybe I would have been, if I hadn't got married in the summer!  This morning it was off down to Millport to put some of our things that are cluttering the flat here in the flat there.  I dropped YKW at school and then drove down; it was a beautiful morning - clear, sunny, snow on the hill tops and I love the sea.  Perfect.

This afternoon I'm putting some information together to give to the Vestry tonight - I have been asked to go and update them on everything I have been doing in my role.  I have been in the job for 4 months now; I hope they think I've got something done!  And I also need to file away all my notes from this term, but I think that I might be running out of time to do that today!

really?

In my reading and research for the final essay of term I naturally wanted to look at some views from both sides of the 'debate.'  On this website I found the following quote:

"When Christians today condemn homosexual behaviour as a sin and contrary to God's purpose they invariably quote the bible to back up their arguments.  Put crudely, but I don't think unfairly, the argument goes 'Homosexuality is condemned in the bible: the bible is the word of God: ergo, homosexual behaviour is sinful.'  Actually, as I said at the beginning of this book these people are not being honest.  The reason they condemn homosexual behaviour is because they are homophobic, the bible is simply an excuse."

The Oxford English Dictionary defines homophobia as follows:

"An intense aversion to homosexuality and homosexuals."

Based on this definition I would have to say that the statement above is incredibly unfair because even where a person believes that homosexuality is outside of God's purpose the majority of these people (in the case of people I know who take this stand, 100% of them) would have an incredibly warm and welcoming attitude to homosexuals.  It is something of a Christian cliche but it really is a case of 'loving the sinner' whilst 'hating the sin.'  This is also, as I discussed with a friend last night, just one area amongst many which the church needs to be focussing in on in the lives of her members.  Unfortunately the fact that this is the issue threatening to tear the church apart means that it is the one to which most space is given at the current time.

In my essay I also used the following (challenging) quote from Dr Margaret Gill's book Free to Love: Sexuality and Pastoral Care:

"It could be that God is less concerned about the rights or wrongs of homosexual practice than some of his followers."

I am not sure if "less concerned" about this issue is the right way of looking at it.  However I am pretty sure that, as I tried to make clear above, he is 'more concerned' about a bunch of other issues than some of us (myself included) realise.

So; Is it really true that those who oppose homosexual practice on biblical grounds are actually using the bible to cover up their homophobia? I would conclude with a resounding "No" whilst acknowledging that there will be (unfortunate) incidents where this is not the case.  I will finish with part of the concluding section of my essay, which I hope outlines the struggles that I am acutely aware of existing in this area:

"I agree with Margaret Gill who acknowledges at the end of her chapter 'Homosexuality and Same-Sex Friendships' that this is an extremely difficult subject to confront as, like her, I have a number of both close friends and relatives for whom homosexuality and (for some) the faith struggle is a daily issue."

It sure ain't easy is it?  But then who said it would be:

'Then Jesus said to his disciples, "If any of you want to come with me, you must forget yourself, carry your cross, and follow me..."'

A Prayer:

O God, make clear to us each road.  O God, make safe to us each steep; when we stumble, hold us; when we fall, lift us up.  When we are hard pressed with evil, deliver us; and bring us at last to Your glory.

finished!

At 8am this morning I had 500 words of my assignment written but had a lot of notes which I had taken yesterday.  I decided that I didn't want it hanging over me into next week and so I put my head down and at about 2pm I had a completed 2742 word essay all ready to hand in!  So that is me done for this term (apart from collecting my results next Tuesday) and because I am on a block placement next term I don't have any more lectures until March/April.  In all, and this is the scary part, I have only 16 whole days of classes left before I (hopefully) graduate.