RE: Tom Bandy Reflection Part One - Palliative Care

[Greg Crawford]

I think the difficulty  in talking about the message and person and work of Christ is that these things are framed in the culture of the ancient middle east. “Christ” is itself a translation of “messiah”, an annointed king whose role is tied to ancient Israelite culture. The work of Christ is tied into a peculiar middle eastern notion that if we slaughter some innocent animal we will feel better about our sins – a completely moronic notion that should be draw to the attention of the RSPCA. “Apocalyptic” seems to keep kicking around with “eschatological” – terms tied to an ancient Israelite duality of time rather than being. We can dispense with these frameworks of thought, but the belief system probably won’t survive the translation properly. We can bandy around such terms, (no pun intended), but it will be unintelligible to people of our own time and day. How can a 21st century Westerner take seriously the rantings of a 2nd millenium B.C. Semite and his ancient notions of “god”?  When it rains, it rains. - Greg   From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Darren Wright Sent: Wednesday, 28 July 2004 3:06 PM To: Greg Crawford Cc: 'insights' Subject: Re: Tom Bandy Reflection Part One - Palliative Care   Gday all, I posted this last night and it somehow didnt make it through to the list: Chris Udy has suggested that the discussion about the anthropomorphic projection of middle-eastern culture into the sky was brought out by being unsure as to what I meant when I said “Common Beliefs.” (by the way Greg I am well aware what anthropomorphic means, even if I cannot spell it... byproducts of doing Theology at age 17) Firstly lets say that I think Tom Bandy would say that in his view Christology is more important than Theology to the culture that we’re connecting with.  To talk about the message and person and work of Christ is of a higher priority than trying to figure out if we’re talking about a God who is in the sky or down below, or alongside or…  Infact I'd think he'd have stared blankly at the discussion over the death of God and thought that it was a waste of time. In a world where the whole truth (to us that might be God) is a mystery or unatainable and relationships are most important he believes that it's Christ they need to meet and know because Jesus evokes  humility and inspires compassion. What I think he says is that we’re trying to introduce people to the life-changing message and life of the Christ-Story. the question people are asking themselves is "who is Jesus and why should it matter to me and my micro-culture." The Christ he believes people are desperate to know is:     The apocolyptic Jesus who meets the yearning to be changed     The healing Jesus who meets the yearning to be whole     The addiction free Jesus meets teh yearning to be free     The equipping Jesus meets the yearning for mentors     The advocate Jesus who meets the yearning for vindication     Jesus the heir to Eden meets the yearning for a meaningful Destiny. Secondly when I mentioned common beliefs in the second reflection it would be those that are owned by the congregation or by the synod or presbytery community.  These would be fairly individualistic and only exist to focus the congregation towards their missional tasks.  The process Tom Bandy puts forward is that it provides less stress to look at Core/Common Values before you look at Core/Common Beliefs.  These would be values that the congregation holds to and beliefs that pull them together, a definition from his workbook: Core Values: A Core Value is a positive preference or choice congregational members can be expected to make, spontaneously or daringly, in daily living. Bedrock Beliefs (which I called Core/Common Beliefs): A Bedrock Belief is a principle, symbol, or article of faith to which congregational participants can be expected to turn for strength in times of confusion or stress. Motivating Vision: A Motivating Vision as the image, metaphor or song in the heart that the mere recollection of elicits joy and courage  from the congregational participants and demands to be shared with strangers. Key Mission: A Key Mission is the audacious, practical goal that demands the single-minded commitment of congregational participants, captures imagination of the public and can be printed on a bus. I hope that helps in the reading of the second reflection.. -- Darren Wright Fool Youth and Family Worker   UCA NSW Synod Presbytery of Canberra Region GPO Box 221. Canberra. ACT. 2601.   [EMAIL PROTECTED]   02 6248 9311 (office)     "The Gospel must be constantly forwarded to a new address, because the recipient is repeatedly changing place of residence." - Helmut Thielicke ------------------------------------------------------ - You are subscribed to the mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] - To unsubscribe, email [EMAIL PROTECTED] and put in the message body 'unsubscribe insights-l' (ell, not one (1)) See: http://nsw.uca.org.au/insights-l-information.htm ------------------------------------------------------