The Vicar Factory

Basic Christianity?

Since i have been at theological college i have been surprised and challenged by the differing beliefs amongst fellow ordinands about what i would perhaps class as basic Christianity.  So i am throwing down out the gauntlet…what do you think is the minimum belief to be a Christian.  Not a vicar or church leader, just a christian.  Is it the death and resurrection of Jesus, is it the virgin birth, is it the trinity?  Or is it believing the whole of the creeds?

What would you suggest is the basic level to be identified as a christian?

and as a further comment…does this level change if you are in or preparing for church leadership.  eg someone can “become” a christian at something like Soul Survivor with a basic understanding of Jesus but before they go into leadership should that be cemented further?

Would love thoughts!

South Africa!

So we finally arrived after what felt like a lifetime in a car and plane including particular highlights of Katy-Grace sleeping on an open bag of maltesers that ended up stuck to her leg and sam tipping a cup of tea into my lap!  However we were greeted at the airport by the vicar of the parish we are on placement in Dave and his wife Bev who have kindly put us up in their own house for the placement.  After picking up the ar we drove to the house to settle in and have lunch.  The children soon made themselves at home….

Dave and Bev then took us out for a drive along the coast to a place called Boulders Bay where we could sit on the beach with the penguins.  The children were running in and out of the water in the penguins occasionally just ran past them and jumped in the water!  It was such a nice introduction to this amazing place! Today we are going to familiarise ourselves with the city before our first two services at St Peters tomorrow followed by an evening service at Christ Church Kenilworth.  Then on monday we are meeting the people who run the Warehouse project which is the main source of our work in the townships etc.

Will blog again after that meeting!

A few thoughts on Hell

Over the last few weeks there has been considerable debate amongst Christians about a book brought out by Rob Bell where he is accused of saying that everyone is going to be saved at the end of time.  I don’t believe that is actually what he says but i confess i haven’t read his book, just reviews and comments by people i trust.  

And this afternoon i come from a core skills session about deliverance and healing which ended in a debate about wether we as Christians should pray for the dead, something that lots of Christians do.  Therefore i thought i would try and document what i currently believe and it will be interesting to look back in the future to see if this changes as i learn more about God.

So here it is in bullet points.

*  I believe that Christians go to Heaven.  

* I believe that some people dont go to heaven.  I dont currently believe they have eternal conscious torment, i think they just cease to exist as they are removed from the presence of God and therefore life is extinct.

* I believe that those who have had no concious opportunity to respond to God  eg unborn children or mentally ill people could be saved by God but that is up to him.  I do not know.

” I believe that God is just and fair

* I believe that God can save everyone if he Chooses, his Grace is sufficient for that.  However he also gives people free will.  I hope he saves everyone but ultimately their is enough evidence in scripture to suggest that their is a judgement and their is a choice.

* I believe that when someone dies, that is it.  Their eternal destination is decided, i dont believe that praying for someone after their death will affect their destination.

* I believe that i dont know everything and that God is far bigger than i can possibly imagine.  I also understand that some of these statements might well be heretical or inaccurately thought through or vocalised.

Finally i understand that i really should be doing essays and not blogging therefore i will leave it at that for now!

:-)

Some thoughts on Prison Ministry

Over the last few weeks i have been spending 2 days a week in Swansea Prison as part of my ministerial training.  I have always wondered what goes on behind the big walls of the prison in Swansea that i have driven past on hundreds of occasions.  

My placement consists of the following.

Sunday Morning 9.30-12.30 which covers both a catholic mass service which has about 10 attendees and an Anglican non-communion service in which the chapel is full (around 40 prisoners)

Wednesday Morning 9.30-12.30.  During this time the prison visits area is given over to the Christian Prison fellowship and prisoners who do not have visitors can get a one on one visit from a Christian volunteer who can have a chat for an hour or so and this wont go against their visit limitations.  

I find this section of my placement particularly rewarding.  Last week i sat with a man in his twenties who was on remand in the prison (not been charged with anything) and he hadn’t had a visit for a few weeks.  While in this visits area you are allowed to buy the prisoner a hot drink and chocolate/crisps which they have to eat during the visit.

The young man i was sat with told me that in the last week he had read the Gospel of Luke and it had turned his life upside down.  He was so excited and passionate about what God could do for him.

One of the biggest issued you find with the prisoners is a complete lack of hope. Most of the prisoners i have chatted with are under 30 and the vast majority of them have or have had an addiction to either heroin or alcohol.  They believe that their lives are now over after being in prison.  

Wednesday Evening 5.30-8pm

On a Wednesday evening the chaplain and volunteers from the prison fellowship have a short service in a room inside the main prison wing with a few hymns and then a short talk by an invited in speaker.  This week i found this incredibly moving. Some of the prisoners were open about their past, their hope for the future and how they believed God could be part of that future.  I have never heard hymns such as amazing grace sung with such passion.  They truly believed what they were singing.

The chaplaincy department has had several success stories and some failures.  They try and follow the prisoners out of prison when they are discharged, meet them at the gate and help them with benefits, finding a job and a home, support from a church and settling back into the community.  

Yesterday I had a guided tour of the whole prison and it was strange to be walking around on the wings with the chaplain, chatting to the prisoners and prison wardens.  As I walked around the prison it made be reflect on a number of things.

1)  Society has to do something in conjunction with the prisoners to try and stop re offending.  Some of the prisoners have been in and out of the system for 20 or more years because living in prison is safer for them than living on the streets.  In prison they are also away from the temptation of drugs.  If we do not break the cycle then these people will never leave prison.

2) Drugs and rehabilitation are key issues that the church has to either support through prayer, resources or volunteering.  Out of 400 prisoners in Swansea nearly 75% have a problem with Heroin.  We need to break this cycle of addiction otherwise crime will just continue and these guys will be in and out like yo-yo’s.

3) Finally it made me think about those Christians who were imprisoned around the world for their faith.  I don’t care what some people think, prison is not a butlins holiday camp.  It is a prison.  As a church we need to be standing in solidarity with those of our brothers and sisters around the world that have restricted liberty because they follow Jesus.

“Clothes appropriate for your holy calling”

Hello,

When i became a Christian nearly 7 years ago i was working in one of the high street banks and wearing a suit was my everyday work clothes.  I began to attend church all from a Christingle Service and wore normal casual clothes.  The traditional Anglican church i went to consisted of mainly older people, generally wearing “Sunday Best” and i certainly was in the vast minority by wearing casual clothes.

Anyway since then lots has happened including a deepening of that faith, exploration of vocations, discernment and selection and now i find myself half way through the formal initial training for ministry.  I returned to my home church yesterday to be Godfather to a close friends daughter and for the occasion i bought myself a new suit (i haven’t worn one since i left the finance industry and my size has changed a little..!)

I haven’t been back in the church for about 3 months due to placement etc during training but the reaction i got when i walked back in a suit was quite alarming!  I had comments ranging from Wow you scrub up well…to….i haven’t seen you this smart since your wedding day.  Im not really concerned to much about these comments and just take them as a compliment (while holding in the back of my head…do i normally look so scruffy?)  But the comments that got me writing this was something that was mentioned by two different people  ”crikey you almost look like a vicar now”

What is that supposed to mean?  You almost look like a vicar?  Do vicars walk around wearing suits?  Maybe on God TV but not at any church i have ever been to.  This leads me on to article 2.14 in the Church in Wales Clergy Terms of Service.  

The dress of Clergy should be suitable to their office;and except for purposes of recreation and other justifiable reasons, should be such as a sign and mark of their holy calling and ministry

So what are clothes suitable for holy calling and ministry?  The reason why i wouldnt want to wear a suit in church is because i dont believe God cares if i dress up smart or not.  It is what is going on in the inside that surely counts.  How would Joe Public feel walking into a church seeing it full of people wearing suits on a sunday..would they fit in?  Is the church supposed to follow the world and judge people on outside appearances or is this something i will no longer be able to hide behind once i have the collar on?

In conclusion i haven’t got a clue what “dress” will be appropriate for my holy calling…if you do then answers on a postcard.

Short Sermon for Chaplaincy Tomorrow.

This is a short sermon i have been asked to give as part of my placement in Morriston Hospital Chaplaincy tomorrow.  The services are very simple and have no readings or liturgy and are always non-eucharistic.

Good Morning and thank you for making the effort to come down to the chapel to be together for this, our celebration of Harvest.  When Nigel first asked me to come and share a few thoughts for this morning the first thing I did was to wonder what Bible readings I should look at.  The reason why is that I am training to be a priest in the Anglican Church and the first thing we are taught in college is that we should preach on the readings that are presented for a given Sunday.  Today we are celebrating harvest so we would normally have readings maybe from Genesis about how God created the Earth or the one we heard earlier from Deuteronomy or the story from the Gospels where Jesus tells people not to worry about things like food and clothing as God will provide everything.  However this service and this hospital is very different to the “normal” world and I think it is important to acknowledge that this morning.  Normally in a service at harvest it would be a celebration of everything that God has given us and provided us and people would probably bring foods to the service to be given to the poor. But I would like to think about something different than food this morning I would like us to think about each other, what we are going through and what Jesus went through.

 Here in this hospital it is a very difficult place, I place where you suffer loneliness, pain, doubts and worries. But I would like to suggest that you are not suffering alone.  First we should remember that Jesus suffered, he bore immense pain, he had rejection from his family, his friends died, he suffered, and he was lonely.  The people who are here with you this morning in this place are suffering with you, they are walking alongside you, they know the same things that are going through your head, they might not have the same condition or illness but they have similar thoughts, fears and worries. That is what I want us to give thanks for this morning.  I want us to thank God that we have this opportunity for us all to come together on a Sunday and being encouraged and be helped along by each other.  In college I am taught that a church should be like a hospital, full of wounded people walking forward towards Jesus, helping each other on the journey to the rest that he provides.  Well here we are, this is it, the church in the hospital.  What I would like to challenge you all to do is be Jesus to the people on your wards, the people in the bed next you and to the staff who treat you.  I want us to be the reason other people are giving thanks to God.  Not to evangelise or to preach to them but to walk alongside them, to offer them a kind word, a smile or a bit of encouragement and to accept the same when you are feeling low and down. 

I would like to finish with a short story.

A Holy man was having a conversation with the Lord one day and said, “Lord I would like to know what Heaven and Hell are like.  The Lord led the Holy man two doors.  He opened one of the doors and the holy man looked in.  In the middle of the room was a large round table.  In the middle of the table was a large pot of stew, which smelled delicious and made the holy mans mouth water.  The people sitting around the table were thin and sickly.  They appeared to be famished.

They were holding spoons with very long handles that were strapped to their arms and each found it possible to reach into the pot of stew and take a spoonful.  But because the handle was longer than their arms they could not get the spoon back into their mouths.

The Holy man shuddered at the sight of their misery and suffering.  The Lord said you have seen hell.

They went to the next room and opened the door.  It was exactly the same as the first one.  There was the large round table with the large pot of stew, which made the holy mans mouth water.  The people were equipped with the same long-handled spoon, but here the people were well nourished and plump, laughing and talking.  The Holy man said “I don’t understand”.

It is simple said the Lord “it requires one skill, you see they have learned to feed other”

On this day celebrating harvest we need to be thankful for each other, for the support we find here in this hospital, and we need to be thankful for Jesus who promises that he will be with us all, even to the end of the age.