The Green Thing

Posted by Steve on July 14, 2011

A friend sent me this the other day – you can find it in several places on the internet in various blogs and so on – now in mine. I find it interesting – if I could turn the clock back, would I? And what would my answer say about me?

The Green Thing

At the till, in the supermarket, the cashier told an older woman that she should bring her own grocery bags because plastic bags weren’t good for the environment. The woman apologized to him and explained, “We didn’t have the ‘green thing’ back in my day.”
The clerk responded, “That’s our problem today; your generation did not care enough to save our environment.”

He was right, that generation didn’t have the green thing in its day.

Back then, they returned their milk bottles, soda bottles and beer bottles. They were sent back to the plant to be washed and sterilized and refilled, so the same bottles could be used over and over. So they really were recycled.
In her day, they walked up stairs, because they didn’t have an escalator or elevator in every store and office building. They walked to the
shops and didn’t climb into a 300-horsepower machine every time they had to go a few hundred yards.
Back then, they washed the baby’s nappies because they didn’t have the throw-away kind. They dried clothes on a line, not in an energy
gobbling machine burning up 220 volts – wind and solar power really did dry the clothes. Kids got hand-me-down clothes from their brothers or sisters, not always brand-new clothing.
Back then, they had one TV, or radio, in the house – not a TV in every room. And the TV had a small screen the size of a handkerchief, not a screen the size of the Isle of Wight. In the kitchen, they blended and stirred by hand because they didn’t have electric machines to do everything for them. When they packaged a fragile item to send in the mail, they used a wadded up old newspaper to cushion it, not Styrofoam or plastic bubble wrap.
Back then, they didn’t fire up an engine and burn petrol just to cut the lawn. They used a push mower that ran on human power. They
exercised by working so they didn’t need to go to a health club to run on treadmills that operate on electricity. They drank from a fountain or tap when they were thirsty instead of using a cup or a plastic bottle every time they had a drink of water. They refilled their writing pens with ink instead of buying a new pen, and they replaced the razor blades in a razor instead of throwing away the
Whole razor just because the blade got dull.
Back then, people took the bus and kids rode their bikes to school instead of turning their parents into a 24-hour taxi service. They had one electrical outlet in a room,not an entire bank of sockets to power a dozen appliances. And they didn’t need a computerized gadget
to receive a signal beamed from satellites 2,000 miles out in space in order to find the nearest take-away.

But he was right, they didn’t have the Green thing back then.

If you can’t live this old fashioned way, at least bring your old paper, card, aluminium cans, and plastic bottles (not glass bottles) to the church recycling bin. The money raised supports our church, the recycling supports our plannet.

Ibn Battuta – boredom in prayer

Posted by Steve on June 29, 2011

When I’m feeling restless and want to go out for a bit, I do like Ibn Battuta Shopping Mall. It’s a small understated little place… about a mile long – at least it feels like it if you make the mistake of doing your food shopping BEFORE you walk to China to get that small thing you wanted from the music shop. I have looked with a camera for interesting patterns in the decoration and there are lots. I have been dragon hunting there – for a script to occupy your children you could try this one which amazed me at how many there are – my children haven’t done it yet but I couldn’t wait. Of course when I have to do ‘ordinary’ shopping I don’t notice, but when I’m there because I just wanted to be out for a bit I enjoy the bustle of shoppers from so many countries but most of all the colourful ‘theme park’ flavour of the decor.

I enjoy it – the mosaics, if they are still not true mosaics, are more believable than the wallpapered MoE ones, the scale of the Egyptian frieze is grand, the Persia dome is beautiful, the Indian elephant clock and the Chinese Junk are, well, fun. On the computer game Sims apparently you can make your people happier by putting art work in their homes and sculptures in the garden and so on and I think I feel that way on going to Ibn Battuta – Ifeel like I have had a change of air.

Some find it all so dissatisfying and say it’s all so fake – well, yes it is, and no it isn’t. What is fake? Isn’t any garden ‘fake’ in that it didn’t grow there by itself like that before you tended it? Isn’t any replica ‘fake’? Isn’t any decorated place fake by that reckoning? Or is it fake if it only pretends to be the original? The mall isn’t pretending on that score – I know it’s not Cordoba I walk into in Adalusia, and the houses aren’t real above the shops in North Africa and Egypt (though I think they should have some secret doors to rooms and balconies above where children could look down on the street below). I just enjoy the light-hearted creativity of a themed environment on such a scale – not fake, but a celebration of styles of decoration and tradition.

I was wondering if I could wangle some spiritual insight into this. Perhaps. If your prayers and spiritual disciplines have become a little claustrophobic, why not visit your usual place of worship at a different time, or visit a different worship place as a tourist. You will keep your regular place and routine because that’s the place you have committed yourself to – unlike shopping, church is not simply entertainment or need based but is commitment in fellowship.

You might see it with new eyes to go when the church is empty, or perhaps when another language group is there bustling about. It might make your own worship less fake, when God had so much more for you to be.

Travelling – taking time out

Posted by Steve on June 5, 2011

I find that it helps with air sickness to have a snack within the last few hours before you travel.

One of the snacks I have, I only have when I travel alone for some reason: If I’m going via terminal 1, with time to spare (ah, that’s why ‘when I travel alone’) I go to ‘my pew’ in the Irish Village pub in the airport departure lounge.

There’s nothing like a Guinness as they say, so I start with that while they get me my Irish Breakfast (two farm fresh eggs, bacon, sausages, black pudding (don’t tell me what’s in it – like Haggis, it tastes OK but what’s in it is on a need to know basis), sauteed mushrooms, tomatoes, and hash, with six slices of toast, orange juice and tea/coffee. All served with good Irish ingredients – Worcester Sauce, English jam/marmalade, French butter, Colmans Mustard (three cheers for Norwich), and Egyptian Tomato sauce. Much like an English Breakfast really, apart from the Irish Coffee. Ahem. This time they weren’t busy so the breakfast arrived before I’d even started the Guinness.

As they bring it all and lay it out it spreads out over the whole table, filling it with bits and pieces for me to survey and enjoy, and I feel like ‘Hmmm, this is the life’ . It’s a pause between whatever I have been doing (signing stuff, dealing with someone debt crisis panic, bit of marriage guidance, and catching up on the latest re visa issues for pastors), and what I will be doing (participating in the ordination service for Catherine Dawkins in Bahrain, Clergy quiet day. etc.) and I really enjoy that pause.

What do you do when you have lunch? Pause to survey and enjoy the world with a consciousness of God, or just wolf it down, eyes on the emails?

If you only have coffee and a sandwich, why not eat it away from your desk and the computer, put the sandwich on a plate like you were in a cafe, put out the salt and pepper picnic style whether you use them or not, put the coffee in a proper mug not a paper cup, sit back and ‘Hmmm…’.

End of the World

Posted by Steve on May 29, 2011

A few weeks ago some folks were getting all excited about the End of the World and I was amazed at how newsworthy it was thought to be…

and someone sent me this cartoon on it from Gospel Communications International, Inc. – I have to put their name to use the cartoon

The Bible readings we’ve been having in recent weeks from John 14 are written to address the coming of the end of the world as the disciples had hoped for it, seeking to put into their minds an understanding that God was with them in whatever upheavals were coming. Of course, the end of the world not having happened yet, we apply this also to our mortality and facing the troubles of death, saying with Psalm 23, even though I may walk through the valley of the shadow of death I will fear no evil for God is with me, and I’m not afraid of God because I’ve known him.

We tend in these modern days to be unfamiliar with the unexpected and do not cope with it so well. We have backups for anything we might lose, we have medicines for almost any sickness, we replace anything that breaks, and are used to carrying on life as we wish so that it is unsettling to be presented with something as unpleasant and as ‘cleansing’ as an End of the World, with no backup, medicine or replacement we can manufacture.

I wonder though if we are troubled by the next life so much as by the troubles that might precede it. Is it the suggestion of impending upset that troubles us with news of the End of the World (now rescheduled for October is it?), or is it that we live so much in the present that we will don’t like to be reminded that each of us will inevitably have a ‘last day’ of some sort in this life, or is it that we are worried about the eternal future after that End of the World as we know it?

Either way, John 14′s a good word for the subject.

Churches, Conferences and Christmas trees

Posted by Steve on May 25, 2011

St Luke's Church, Ras Al Khaimah

Spent some time up north yesterday. Interesting how the new St. Luke’s is coming on. They are planning an opening ceremony with the Bishop on October 18th so there’s an advance date for your diaries. If you go and have a look now to see how it’s going on, don’t bother washing your car before you go – the dust there is amazing – the finest powder I’ve ever seen and if you drive through it fast…those downwind will curse you but it looks amazing!

While there we sized up somewhere that might be suitable to hold our annual Synod in 2013. We would like synod to be held in the UAE and the Al Hamra Palace Hotel looks a nice place and should be open by then Hope they can give a good price, though how we show the delegates the rest of the UAE from there would be interesting – perhaps charter a private 150 seater plane from Um Al Quwain and parachute out over St. Andrew’s Abu Dhabi – go go go! ? LOL. While we were gawping at that wonderful place, and the Al Hamra fort next door (also a nice looking venue), we ate in the Al Hamra Mall at Feast International Buffet and Steakhouse where we met Charlie Chaplain – from India, but he could really do the walk and stuff and looked the part. Charlie’s going back next week but the Buffets staying – I can recommend it.

And when I got back, there were 20 christmas trees about to be unloaded – we want to have a Christmas tree competition/festival at Christ Church in December this year and they were a good price, it not being that close to the season. Even beat the shops in England who will be selling Christmas decor in a month or so. The idea is that each tree is ‘sponsored’ by a different group, decorated in an appropriate style perhaps for their group. Then for a week at the end of term you can roam the forest admiring them all, and so on.

If you have any other ideas as to where would be a good place to invite our diocesan synod to meet in 2013, do say – but the catch is, it’s got to be comparable with prices in Cyprus!