Scripture and the Authority of God

Scripture and the Authority of God
N. T. Wright (Bishop of Durham)
SPCK
ISBN 0-281-05722-2

The back cover starts “What sort of 'authority' does the Bible have? What does it mean for an ancient, complicated and sometimes strange book to be 'authoritative' in the life of the church or individual Christians?” If you don't have a ready answer for the question and would like one, the I suggest you read on. I read it, not because of the back cover, but because it is a set book in my training course. If it hadn't been I might have missed out on a stimulating and thought provoking book. Looking at Scripture in our own time and throughout Christian history, and the way that various different movements have dealt with it, in particular for me the discussion on the enlightenment was most interesting. Some of the other interesting questions answered are What is tradition? What does literal reading really mean? What is the place of 'reason'? What is the place of experience?

Bishop Wright also deals with the misreadings briefly, go through the list and pick the top five that apply to you.

At 107 pages this is very much an introduction to the main topic, and there are plenty of references if you want to dig deeper. My only criticism is that some of the chapters are rather too compressed, and I had to read them very carefully to make sure that I was getting the meaning.

The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe

The story in the book is an allegory of the Christian faith, so it is no surprise to find that secular commentators do not understand what is happening in the film. Their biggest criticism is not that there's a deeper magic, so that Aslan can be resurrected - that's all nice and mystical. Their biggest criticism is that the children are made Kings. Well that's true of the reviews I've read anyway. So what of the film itself. From what I remember it did justice to the original story. The special effects were very good. Aslan was easily believable, and the beaver was a star! So was Georgie Henley as Lucy, while the other children were OK, Georgie was very good indeed. I didn't find the white witch particularly scary, but we must remember that the story is intended for children, and too make her too scary and risk upping the certificate would have been counter productive.

So I recommend that you go see the film, and have a very enjoyable time.

THUD

THUD
Terry Pratchet
Doubleday ISBN 0385 608675

Another excellent book in the Discworld series from Terry Pratchet, and another one without chapters.  The dwarves and the Trolls have never been friends, rather they have been enemies.  Now there are so many of them in the city that trouble is about to occur in Ankh-Morpork. The ONLY one who can sort it out is Commander Vimes of the city Watch (police).  This is more than just a war story (well not a war story at all really), it has some good characterisations, some new characters, and the usual cast of old friends.  There is also some nice comment on the modern world.  I especially like the organiser – it is actually useful here!  The i-pod was a bit more un-believable, but this is a magic world, after all. Sam actually scores a point off Vetinari.  If you have a good imagination, there’s also a wonderfully comic scene with cabbages.  


If you haven’t read it already, then I strongly suggest you put a day or two aside, because you won’t want to put it down.

Reader Training Nov 2005

Reader Training

As many of you will know I was selected for Reader training (only training, they’re very definite about that).  I’m not going to cover what a reader does here, just give you all an update on the process, and how I’m progressing.
Firstly there are a number of things that you have to get set up, some you do yourself, and others are part of the course.  You MUST have a spiritual director, and they will offer a list of names.  That finally came through this week, so I have to ring one of the two people on the list, and see if they are prepared to accept me (and I them, of course).  Then there’s the tutor group, there are four of us in the group, three are from the Chelmsford Christian studies group, so I’m already with friends.  Tutor groups meet about once a month.  My tutor is based in Thorpe Bay, and as most of the group are local to Chelmsford, we meet alternately in Billericay and Thorpe Bay.  The other person you have to meet with regularly is your incumbent, no problem there!  The there are the training days at Chelmsford, always a Saturday, and again roughly once a month.
So what do we do?  We started with a quiet day in the church at Wickham Bishops, and were given a number of different passages and ideas to reflect on.  It is always good to put aside a reasonable amount of time and dedicate it to prayer and reflection.  As you must have guessed I had a wonderful day, and came back really looking forward to getting started properly.  The first thing we have to do is prepare and present a Bible Study.  I spent four hours with no-one around, and my books spread out all over the lounge, studying a chapter of Acts, and trying to extract the theology.  I’ve done mine now, I also tried so experiments with the presentation, which didn’t work as well as I would have liked – but that’s what training is for!  I don’t know whether I passed or not, as there are still two other bible studies to go.  Then we have to prepare a hermeneutics paper, about 2000 words.  This is due in January, so I will spend most of my time in December working on it.  Later there will be Leading Worship, to practice, projects in the parish to complete and write up, and a time spent in another parish.  At the November family service I was preparing for the ‘Worship’ training day, and taking lots of notes.  It was a very good service, and there are many positives to take from it, so thankyou to the seventeen people who made it work so well.  Towards the end of the course we will have to prepare and deliver a sermon in the church in Thorpe Bay.  That will also be an interesting experience.  That’s not all, but I don’t want to bore you with too much detail now.  Lookout for updates in future Spotlights.

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The Science of Discworld III: Darwin's Watch

The Science of Discworld III: Darwin’s Watch
Terry Pratchet, Ian Stewart & Jack Cohen
Ebury Press 2005 ISBN 00918 982 34

When I was thinking about writing this I came across http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2005/11/intelligent_des_2.html, which as you can see is all about the issue of intelligent design. This is one of the topics covered in the book. I have to say the comments in the blog really do fit my own views, except that I come from the other side of the argument. Now I wasn’t looking for this, I just ‘stumbled across it’, and it’s a really nice way into what I want to say. The book starts out with a zeal for its message that the religious fundamentalists would understand. Why do we have to read through all this anti-religious ‘preaching’ about evolution? The authors clearly have strongly held views, and have not considered adequately either the effect on the reader, or that many of the scientists have a strong religious faith of their own. Throughout the rest of the book there is a story of the discworld Wizards acting as God in the roundworld, to alter the timeline, so that Darwin writes “The Origin of the Species”. It’s a nice story, but again somewhat overplayed. If the probability of Darwin actually writing this book is so low, why did it happen?

So what are we left with? Well there’s some interesting ‘science’. Not the sort of science where a prediction is made and then tested, revised, tested, and so on. This is the sort of ‘science’, which is mainly ‘mathematical models’. Entirely theory, and not able to be validated by observation. This it seems is where all ‘science’ leads. Perhaps we’ve gone far enough with pure ‘science’, and our future is in technology – the exploitation of our understanding, to make our lives more bearable, but I’ll get accused of preaching if I go on.

Unless you’re a REAL fan – don’t bother.

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire - the film

Having read the book quite a long time ago, I was aware of the story in general. I’d also heard that the film tells the story better than the book. Well I’m not going to agree or disagree with that. One reaction to the film is that it is too long, I can’t agree with that, but its best if I’m not the judge because the Lord of the Rings films also received the same response from some. If you have a good story and it takes 157 minutes to tell so be it. It is a good story, a very good story. In the film it is well told, and the interaction between the characters gives you a good understanding of what’s going on. I particularly like the ball for this. The special effects were superb, as usual and the ideas from the book were well portrayed. So a very enjoyable film, well worth the extra booking fee that the cinema charges.

Only one or two little niggles - Rupert Grint (Ron) just looked too grown up in a couple of scenes. Michael Gambon (Albus Dumbledore) just didn’t have the sympathetic approach of the character in the book.

Nanny McPhee

Nanny McPhee
A large family of 7 children with only a father frightens the nanny away.  This has happened many times before we pick up the story.  The last Nanny runs away when the children apparently eat the baby.  That was one of the least convincing parts of the film.  So an ugly super-natural Nanny arrives, with a number of lessons to teach the children.  There are a few other stories running throughout the film.  Will the father marry the housemaid, who is the only one the children like, and is also the only one who likes the children?  Will the horrid old aunt keep supporting them as she has promised?  Will the children learn their lessons?

Will the film live up to the opportunities of the plot?  This one I will answer. No, it does not.  There are plenty of opportunities, but somehow we never get there.  The children aren’t nasty enough, by half.  Think of Wednesday in the Adams family, she was nastier than the whole bunch of them put together.  What of Nanny McPhee, who appears next to people and says “I did knock”.  Think of a scary Mary Poppins, if that doesn’t work for you, you’ll start to understand why this film doesn’t work either.  There are some redeeming features.  The gay morticians, who managed not to say ‘suit you sir’, and the cook (Imelda Staunton) are both genuine clowns.