P&G

Busy couple days. Tuesday got a call to do some temp work at Procter & Gamble. So Weds-Friday and all next week I’ll be scanning in articles, documents, images, and the like. Creating folders, files, and pdfs of all of it. I appreciate the work and its cool to see the “inside” of P&G. But it is not “extrovert” work – today I didn’t talk to anyone till 3:30 PM (and I started at 8:00 AM)! Wow, I’m glad it is only temp.

I’m still hopefully and praying for the Xavier job (I welcome your prayers too). Haven’t heard anything yet, but its still early in the game. I really, really would like to 1) have a steady job/schedule/income, 2) like to work at Xavier – for the ministry, mission, community, learning, and more. It would also be fun to be a part of a university that had a decent basketball team!

Saw The Passion last night. I’m still stunned – not much I can say but, wow. I’m humbled, awed, sad, overwhelmed, hurt, angry, and impressed all at the same time and on multiple levels. Mostly though, I’m just stunned.

Joi Ito's Web: Understanding culture through motion pictures

Joi Ito’s Web: Understanding culture through motion pictures

I saw “Lost in Translation” last night and this morning at the Y (while half working out) I found an article in a magazine about this guy, Joi Ito, who has a blog and it’s more of a destination or online community than a personal journal. Anyhow, he talks about understanding culture through movies and about “Lost in Translation” so there you go.

I liked “Lost…” it was slow, almost lethargic, but visually stunning and full of emotional/romantic tension that didn’t result in an elicit affair or abandoning of one’s “previous” life. Bill is up for best actor. Not sure if I’d pick him, but it was good.

I have significant left ear pain and congestion. I need to call the doctor.

Vineyard Central History

Vineyard (de)Central(ized) and on the Move

E-pistle to the Vineyard Central Family – March 11, 2003

Kevin’s blog from March 2003 (I remember reading this a year ago, weird)

Todd Hunter’s March 2003 blog

E-pistle to the Vineyard Central Family – November 1, 2002

Pastoral Council Decisions

Being Ordained by Vineyard Central

A letter by Owen Brock for the Pastoral Council

E-pistle to the Vineyard Central Family – June 4, 2002

Update on Building Transition July 2002

The “official” history

Next Generation Vineyard an interview with Dave Nixon in Cutting Edge – Winter 2001 (I think this is how I first heard of VC – about 2 years ago)

Next Steps an interview with Kevin Rains in Cutting Edge – Winter 2001

Community House Commitments

VC in the Press

Oh, and there’s this link for the Slow Food Movement

Wow, that’s a lot of links. Google’s “search current site” feature is really cool. I read/skimmed all of them, but I won’t attempt to comment on all. Today was the second day of the Jesus Film Fest. Watched Last Temptation and Jesus of Montreal for the first time today. Both good. I really liked Jesus of Montreal. In reflecting on all the Jesuses that I’ve encountered over the last two days I have to say that what strikes me most is how Jesus (all of them) is a leveler and lover. He is an equalizer. Beyond that my mind is mush after 2 days of TV watching and overloaded with Jesus narratives. I did see 2 naked Jesus today.

Oh, back to VC history. There is something about the history – the collective story of VC, that resonates with me. I’m not trying to sound mystical or whatever, but its story as a community is somewhat similar to the my story as a person. A story where Church of the Saviour, Henri Nouwen, St. Patrick, and Lectio Divina are discoveries along the way. These were not the things that I grew up with, rather I grew into them or they grew into me. I think that is part of the reason I feel so “at home” with VC. Despite not quite knowing where or how I’ll fit or what my role is here yet – I can resonate with the vision, the direction that VC is going.

And the road goes ever on….

I want this job

Assistant Director of the Learning Assistance Center

I really do. So please, if you are prayin’ folk, PRAY! I think I would have a lot to offer the Center and Xavier. I also think it would be a good growing experience for me. It’s a leadership position that, according to the Director (who I met today), is 80% people/20% task. That is SO me. I would love working with college students, I am eager to get to know the Catholic (Xavier is a Jesuit school) side of the Christian family, and it is about a half mile from here! I think it would be a great ministry and service opportunity.

The president (who is a priest) of the university has this to say – “Xavier University is dedicated to engaging and forming students intellectually, morally and spiritually, with rigor and compassion, toward lives of solidarity and service. … We also place great emphasis on the spiritual development of our students.”

I think this job would stretch me and grow me and provide lots of great connections and opportunities. I think it would also provide enough financially for Sarah to stay home with Cloey (which is what we’ve been hoping for). Xavier (unlike Fuller!) offers FULL Tuition Remission for full-time employees and 90% remission to spouses and children after the first year of working there. I could take classes to finish my Fuller degree at Xavier (they also offer a MA in Theology) and Sarah could do a masters or art stuff or whatever as well!

I really think this would be a great opportunity. My understanding of the process is that it has to make it through a committee of faculty, staff, and students first, then to the Director of the Learning Center (Ann Dinan) – who I met and felt like I connected with today, and then there would be several interviews (even with a VP). So pray that it makes it through this first hurdle (the committee screening) next week and in general just pray that if this is the position that God has for me that everything would fall into place quickly (we’re getting low on funds).

"Sacred space, profane time" – post from v-2

Came across this post (thanks to Bob Carlton and Steve Collins). I like it. For three reasons. One. i think there is a kingdom-feel to it. Two. the writer may or may not be a self-professed Jesus-follower. Three. I love the design of the site, there is someting simple yet rich about it. Steve Collins concurs, “the restraint and elegance of the template, … the consideration for standards and accessibility. the colour scheme works for those with visual impairments, it’s available in a large type version with one click. exemplary.” Go visit.

Here’s a quote:

“I’m a lifelong atheist, long accustomed to church-avoidance, so it wasn’t until I was in my thirties that I actually attended services of a high cathedral: midnight mass at St. John the Divine, one Christmas Eve. The air was warm with the press of people – travellers, as I would soon enough understand – and fragrant with incense. The void at the building’s heart was charged: with fellowship, with joy, with a sense of expectation. And I knew all at once what cathedrals were and were supposed to be, in the minds of their original architects: nothing less than airports for God to land at.

Cathedrals are airports. Like airports, there was at least one in every major city or population center. They were great civic works, huge undertakings of fundraising, resource-management, engineering. Their aisles, landing strips picked out not in high-intensity blue but in flickering candlelight. I don’t want to take the metaphor too far, make it too crushingly literal, but I think now of cathedrals (and mosques, temples, shrines, iglesias and storefront full-gospel churches in the high press of their services) as nodes of a numinous travel network perpendicular to ordinary space and time. In the proper frame of reference, to enter them is to cross a threshold and be taken somewhere else, just as surely as I do when I board a jetliner. That’s what I mean by “sacred.”

Jesus Film Fest

Ya’ll come!

I keep wonder about the date so I googled

Easter on the Net – When is Easter? Easter 2004

Ash Wednesday is 25 February

Palm Sunday is 4 April

Good Friday is 9 April

(Western) Easter Sunday is 11 April

(Orthodox) Easter Sunday is 11 April

Pretty cool that Orthodox and Western Easter on the same day this year. I wonder if we could partner with an Orthodox church in our celebration….. hummm……

Random Links

Cajun Power Sauce

The Catechesis of the Good Shepherd

Razormouth.com – cutting-edge christian news, reviews and punditry

Is the Emerging Church just another Male thing?

Rebirthing Worship

As the officially unofficial mid-west representative for the Wor·ship Re·nais·sance I want to tell you about a great opportunity to learn cool stuff from a cool guy:

Read this guy's post (and Greenhouse drawing to a close)

Greg Quiring : The Things We Think and Do Not Say – check it out! Well said.

Still at Greenhouse. 10:23 AM, we dine at 12:30 and leave promptly thereafter. We (hopefully) fly out of Atlanta at 4:30, home around 6:00. I’ve met some great folk – John, Brent, Bill, Jere, Adam, Melissa, Bill, Jan, Matt, Bob, Tara. Hopefully some will join us at the next regional allgroup. I love being in the south…. the sweet southern accent, the sweet tea (iced, thank you very much), the biscuits and gravy, the evergreens, the rolling hills. Very nice. It feels like home. It feels good for the soul. Inflating my spirit.

I’ve also enjoyed getting to know Kevin better. He’s a cool guy. Very reflective and real. An honest person with a strong spirit and a good heart. I look forward more opportunities like this to come.