News archive
October 2006 Conference report
Posted 18th April 2007
“Building a Progressive Christian Spirituality”
With Robert Beckford, Gordon Lynch and workshop leaders Tess Ward, Dave Tomlinson and Chris Shannahan.
“Wooly Liberals never die - they simply get moth-eaten” - Posy Simmons
The Word this year came not from across the Atlantic but from down the road - Birmingham in fact. Perhaps because of this it seemed to have a greater directness and relevance to us here at St. Mark’s than might have come from greater luminaries.
We felt somewhat moth-eaten as we were challenged by the dynamic Robert Beckford to take several leaves out of the fundamentalist evangelicals’ book in our efforts to put across a positive progressive Christian message.
Robert gave us the depressing statistics which demonstrated the decline in churchgoing, especially among young people - apart from the evangelical churches. where the decline is considerably less. He advised us to move forward from the sanctification of doubt to a much more dynamic, positive and exciting approach,
Robert is all for using every modern method of media communication, and he showed us a short film by an agency he had commissioned to advertise Liberal Christianity. It was clear that the film-makers felt that they did not have much to get hold of.
His suggestion that we could learn from the Religious Right in the U.S. made not a few of us uncomfortable. What mattered were the dominant ideas that the Right have succeeded in communicating over the years by campaigning and by bold use of the Media. It was time for us to start making liberal ideas dominant in UK society.
Gordon Lynch, a theologian from Birmingham University, pointed to issues that we would do well to focus on in putting across our values - issues like trade and justice, human rights, the arms trade, gender and sexuality, and the environment. Organisation was also vital - for example, the creation of Resource Centres such as those we are developing here at St. Mark’s.
In his Workshop, Gordon advised us to pay attention to our liberal ancestors as we create new metaphors for the Divine, develop a faith that doesn’t oppress women, and explore new forms of spirituality that connect with those outside the churches. I t is also vital for us to discover the Sacred in science and, in connecting creatively with Nature, we can emphasise the Divine in us, with us and around us. Nature is the site in which we encounter the Divine. We ourselves are sacred and part of the unfolding story of the Universe, the part that is conscious of itself.
The Workshop was a rich experience which provided us with many memorable insights, such as “attending to that within us which inspires us and gets us going”, and “The spiritual journey is a quarter of an inch long but many miles deep.”
Tess Ward’s Workshop was a wonderful break from the business and challenge of the rest of the Conference ; we were encouraged to look at our faith holistically and use the Celtic Wheel of the Year for meditation. Tess is publishing a book next year which will help us to do just that.
We were not able to attend the other two workshops but we have had good reports of them.
The day finished with a lively Plenary Session in which all the speakers and workshop leaders took part as well as Hugh Dawes from PCN Britain.
The whole Day was a positive experience which jolted us out of our rather timid complacency and challenged us to look forward with enthusiasm and courage.