Feb 24 2012
Friendship by Flickr / johnthescone
True friendship is being able to insult another person without feeling the need to apologise or explain.
Unfortunately, the same could be said of outright hostility.
Life’s full of fun little ambiguities like that.
Permanent link to this article: http://jamesthevicar.com/wordpress/2012/02/24/true-friendship/
Feb 23 2012
The evil law-breaking, phone-hacking, corrupt, “mafia”-run (according to Tom Watson MP) News of the World was closed down by News International because of the public revulsion and horror at what they had perpetrated, particularly in accessing and deleting messages from the voicemail of kidnapped and murdered schoolgirl, Milly Dowler. The last issue was published on 10 July 2011.
On Sunday, it is rebooted (really, you don’t believe this is a new publication, do you?) as the Sun on Sunday.
Remember that date for a moment, 10 July 2011. Now, look at this:
Domain name:
thesunonsunday.co.uk
Registrant:
NI Group Limited
…
Relevant dates:
Registered on: 05-Jul-2011
Hang on, 5 July 2011? That’s before 10 July 2011.
This was always News International’s intention.
Don’t buy the Sun – on Sunday or any other day.
Permanent link to this article: http://jamesthevicar.com/wordpress/2012/02/23/dont-buy-the-sun-on-sunday/
Feb 22 2012
I have an exclusive: I can reveal an early draft of the logo for News International’s “new” newspaper, the News of the World sorry, the Sun on Sunday:
Remember: Don’t buy the Sun!
Permanent link to this article: http://jamesthevicar.com/wordpress/2012/02/22/no-its-not-just-a-rehashed-news-of-the-world-honest/
Feb 21 2012
Last night, the Luton Deanery Synod debated the proposed Anglican Communion Covenant and voted on whether or not to recommend to the St Albans Diocesan Synod that it should be accepted. The debate was a good one, with good will on both sides and generosity towards those whose views differed from the speakers’ – again from both sides (as an aside, an example others would do well to follow – where possible, see the best intentions in those with whom you disagree).
After the debate came the vote and in both the House of Clergy and the House of Laity, the Synod narrowly voted to accept the Covenant.
This is not the point of this piece though. The thing that interested me most was that in the House of Laity (the number of clergy in attendance was woefully low and so the vote in that house could have experienced a statistically dramatic swing by even one extra person turning up), the number of abstentions was more than double the size of the margin between those who voted Yes and those who voted No.
This suggests to me that the general feeling in respect of the Covenant is one of apathy, or to put it another way…
Meh!
The reasons for this will be manifold – a combination of being poorly informed (even in the case of those who have taken on the roles of making decisions in the Synodical structure) about the importance of the proposed Covenant and simply wanting to “get on” with other things probably accounts for a lot of the apathy.
I’m not sure that apathy is a good basis upon which to progress down a route that could dramatically alter the nature of the Anglican Communion but it seems that it’s the way by which the Covenant could ultimately be adopted.
Permanent link to this article: http://jamesthevicar.com/wordpress/2012/02/21/thoughts-on-the-anglican-covenant/
Feb 12 2012
Preached this morning at St Francis’. This is part of our current monthly series on Old Testament Heroes and Heroines (part six of seven). I posted the text as Wordles yesterday.
Both talks are available as MP3 or Ogg Vorbis.
Permanent link to this article: http://jamesthevicar.com/wordpress/2012/02/12/sermon-samuel/
Feb 11 2012
That’s right folks, two Wordles this week! They’re roughly the same passage – 1 Samuel 3.1-4.1a but at the all-age service this Sunday at “10.30 for 11.00″, we’re just reading up to verse 10. So, first the shorter version of the reading, then the full chapter:
The prime theme here appears to be the relationship between YHWH, Samuel and Eli with “calling” also being significant in the early part of the chapter.
Samuel’s ministry is primarily about YHWH – it is YHWH who initiates the relationship and (as will be seen by reading on through the books that carry Samuel’s name), it is always YHWH’s activity and Samuel acts as the mouthpiece.
Secondly, Samuel seeks the counsel of the person in authority over him, the wise and trusted leader. This is because he has not yet learned to recognise the voice of YHWH and it good advice for all of us when we think we are being called, summoned or led into a new area of ministry – check it out with our pastors.
Thirdly, Samuel seeks to listen to God before he acts. “Speak YHWH for your servant is listening” is one of the hardest prayers to pray but without it, he could not have heard the shocking words that YHWH was going to speak to him. He has to speak words of judgment on Eli and his house and prophecy the sweeping away of the old way of doing things. Samuel between the time of the Judges and a new era in Israel’s national life, the establishment of the Monarchy. YHWH will hear the requests of his people later in Samuel’s life for a king and although this represents a rejection of YHWH’s kingship, YHWH has already put in place the person who will be the kingmaker. If Samuel can speak YHWH’s hard words to Eli, with whom he has grown up in the Temple, he can be trusted with YHWH’s heart in choosing kings.
Permanent link to this article: http://jamesthevicar.com/wordpress/2012/02/11/word-as-wordle-bogof/
Feb 07 2012
Preached Sunday at “10.30 for 11.00″ at St Francis’. The text was 1 Thessalonians 4 and the audio is available as MP3 or Ogg Vorbis.
I earlier published the text as a Wordle.
Permanent link to this article: http://jamesthevicar.com/wordpress/2012/02/07/sermon-live-the-life/
Feb 07 2012
There’s been a lot of discussion on Twitter over the last day or so about the live audio stream of General Synod and the fact that since it’s only available in an evil proprietary format (ASX), there are a great many people who can’t access it.
So here’s the solution, you can access it by MP3.
Now, a couple of things. Firstly, it’s running on my home broadband line on my laptop. If it’s unavailable for some reason, by all means let me know but also accept that I may not fix it right then.
Secondly, be cool. If the ASX stream works for you, then please use it – I don’t want my ISP battering me about tons of data going over my line just because people can. Also, if you can stop it during breaks, that’ll help a lot too.
With those in mind, enjoy the stream.
Permanent link to this article: http://jamesthevicar.com/wordpress/2012/02/07/general-synod-mp3-stream/
Feb 06 2012
A dose of Man Flu has me on the sofa under a blanket being subjected to the endless stream of property development related programming that passes for daytime television these days.
I am utterly fed up with letting agents on these monstrosities talking about flats or houses “achieving” a certain amount per month.
The residence is not achieving anything. It is putting no effort into the process, it has no say in the amount charged in rent.
Please can people stop abusing the English language in this manner and simply say “I think we could expect to let this house for …”?
No? Well, at least I asked.
Permanent link to this article: http://jamesthevicar.com/wordpress/2012/02/06/no-substitute-for-achievement/
Feb 02 2012
One of the joys – and difficulties – of having a large team is sometimes a few weeks can elapse between preaching. During February this year, for various reasons, I’m preaching almost every Sunday though. This coming Sunday, our text is 1 Thessalonians 4 and here it is as a Wordle:
Paul seems to turn at this point in his letter to issues raised by the Thessalonian Christians – perhaps that they’ve relayed through Timothy for Paul or perhaps they had asked Timothy for advice and he had in turn wanted to refer to Paul. The society in which they found themselves was not too different to our own and it seems that they wanted to be guided in their response to three areas of obsession that their and our society share:
Paul’s response in each of these areas is a summary of how to “Live the Life” and on Sunday, we’ll be exploring this at St Francis’ at 10.30 for 11.00 (another member of the team is preaching at 9.15).
Come and join us!
Permanent link to this article: http://jamesthevicar.com/wordpress/2012/02/02/word-as-wordle-1-thessalonians-4/
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