Stealing Transcendence
Posted by Paul | Filed under photos
“…wilderness cannot be home because it does not provide the necessary culture-forming resources to make it home….The wilderness is preeminently the place where it seems impossible to fulfil our calling to be God’s image-bearing agents in creation. It becomes a place where [we are] reawakened to the gift character of the world.”
Middleton & Walsh (from “truth is stranger than it used to be”)
I’ve been experimenting a little with some photo ‘re-mixes’. Taking an old desert photo of mine (from a visit to Joshua Tree National Park) and ‘borrowing’ some textures from Makoto Fujimura (taken from his Countenance donation at The By/For Project.)
Here’s a taster
For more see the Desert Perspectives album.
“Thank God for hard stones; thank God for hard facts; thank God for thorns and rocks and deserts and long years. At least I know now that I am not the best or strongest thing in the world. At least I know now that I have not dreamed of everything.”
G.K. Chesterton
column :: joseph
Posted by Paul | Filed under columns
Another slightly dated column, so to set the context: it was written around the time when reality show ‘Any Dream Will Do’ was working it’s magic…
Have you ever imagined how the story of Joseph might play out as reality TV?
Welcome back to Pyramids and Presidents. It’s day 3429 in Pharaoh’s jail and two of the housemates have had dreams. Joseph has revealed his talent for interpretation and now has break the bad news — one of them is for the chop. If you think the baker should get his old job back, text BAKER. On the other hand, if you think the butler is Joseph’s best bet for mentioning his case to Pharaoh, text BUTLER.
Umm, I suspect the viewing figures might drop after the first decade. We’re more into instant celebrity than long-term training. On the other hand, for those of us who will never achieve overnight success, it’s reassuring to know that God does things differently.
giving and receiving
Posted by Paul | Filed under uncategorised
Yesterday’s reading in the excellent advent collection Watch for the Light was from William Willimon. Here’s an extract:
Charles Dickens’ story of Scrooge’s transformation has probably done more to form our notions of Christmas than St. Luke’s story of the manger. Whereas Luke tells us of God’s gift to us, Dickens tells us how we can give to others. A Christmas Carol is more congenial to our favorite images of ourselves. Dickens suggests that down deep, even the worst of us can become generous, giving people.Yet I suggest we are better givers than getters, not because we are generous people but because we are proud, arrogant people. The Christmas story – the one according to Luke not Dickens – is not about how blessed it is to be givers but about how essential it is to see ourselves as receivers.We prefer to think of ourselves as givers – powerful, competent, self-sufficient, capable people whose goodness motivates us to employ some of our power, competence and gifts to benefit the less fortunate. Which is a direct contradiction of the biblical account of the first Christmas. There we are portrayed not as the givers we wish we were but as the receivers we are.…This strange story tells us how to be receivers. The first word of the church, a people born out of so odd a nativity, is that we are receivers before we are givers. Discipleship teaches us the art of seeing our lives as gifts. That’s tough, because I would rather see myself as a giver. I want power – to stand on my own, take charge, set things to rights, perhaps to help those who have nothing. I don’t like picturing myself as dependent, needy, empty-handed.…It’s tough to be on the receiving end of love, God’s or anybody else’s. It requires that we see our lives not as our possessions, but as gifts. “Nothing is more repugnant to capable, reasonable people than grace,” wrote John Wesley a long time ago.…This is often the way God loves us: with gifts we thought we didn’t need, which transform us into people we don’t necessarily want to be.
Tags: books, grace, provocations
A random walk over culture, art, christianity, etc. with occasional photographs...