East Lancs Railway

Spent some time last Saturday at the East Lancashire Railway in Bury..

the photos wont upload but you can see them at http://www.flickr.com/photos/19757911@N00

one week's visitors at the Salvation Army

This week at our community centre we've been trying to keep a count of the people who have come into the building for activities, meetings or help. It's been a pretty busy week and not finished yet but it looks as if we will top 500 in the total count. And this has been a week when several of our regular groups were not running.. But it seems all human life has been there.. and it's kept us on our toes... The list has included:

about 15 volunteers with disabilities or learning dificulties working on our garden project or lunch club.

10 homeless big issue sellers

4 destitute people asking for clothing or in the case of one couple sleeping bags and blankets so they can be more comfortable when sleeping rough

40 students involved in the Christian Union Freshers week

over 100 people attending the AGMs of two voluntary sector organisations

30 local tenants to their landlords display of possible kitchen improvements

30 members of the regular meetings of the MS group, and Narcotics Anonymous

50 elderly ladies at fellowship or social club meetings

Not to mention 3 disruptive youngsters intent on causing trouble or making a nuisance leading to visits from a fire engine and two police constables working on the case.

Tomorrow we've got a consultation on ministry among new migrant communities....and on Sunday there will be regular Salvation Army...

And I've been trying to get space to work on multiple funding bids for the next stage involving an ICT project..

How do we find time to reflect and build an adequate theology and spiritual dynamic to cover all of this.... Thankfully God is big enough to hold it together...

Colossians 1

15He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. 16For by him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him and for him. 17He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. 18And he is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything he might have the supremacy. 19For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, 20and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross

Some holiday photos

JUST Back From Holidays

In Berwick On Tweed and Northumberland where I took these photos of seine net salmon fishers on the river, and plenty more you can see at http://www.flickr.com/photos/19757911@N00/

Also a family week at Capernwray Hall

Both highly recomended.

Frank Smith : Born 100 years ago today

Today. September 1st 2006 is the centenary of the birth 9f my father Frank Smith. sadly he died in 1975 so is not eligible for the Royal Telegram

See http://www.maister-smith.fsnet.co.uk/familyweb/smiths.htm

for a bit of the family history.

Obviously the anniversary makes one reflective and nostalgic, and gives a sense of the passage of the years. But from a personal viewpointit makes me thankful and happy that I had the privilege of knowing my Dad and of being my father's son.

The second of ten children in a Lincolnshire Methodist family he lived in the county all his life except for a few years or reluctant military service in World war II. He was far from rich or famous, left school and home at 13 to work "in service" on a large local farm, subsequently moving out of agriculture into the building trade . When he retired in the 1970's he was soon on an old age pension of £30 a week which was more than he had ever earned.

I remember my dad as a loving warm hearted parent, but above all as an intelligent and learned self taught man. Though he had been denied the chance of a thorough formal education, he was a great reader, and had valuable opinions on politics, history and science and loved to talk about these issues with anyone. One of his best stories was how during the war an officer inspecting the barracks had found a copy of Marx's Das Kapital on his bedside table, and asked if he had been reading this sunversive rubbish. In a reply which verged on insubordination he said "Sir, I think if you could be bothered to read it yourself you would find it is not rubbish at all".

To my Dad then I owe much of my own intellectual development, and a fair amount of my personality (we won't go into details there). He also gave me a love of cycling as pleasure and as a means of transport, though undoubtedly he was faster than me. One of my treasured possessions is his medal for the fastest veteran in a club race in 1950, 1hr 8 mins for a 25 mile time trial.

Unlike my mother, and the most of his brothers he found conventional Christian Faith somewhat difficult, and though he rarely talked about it, probably lived and died an agnostic. But if God's grace is as broad as I understand it to be and if you can judge a person by the fruits of their life, then I tend to belief that he has one of the many mansions in our Father's house.

Hello again

This is a new blog that I've had to set up as somehow in the upgrading to the BETA system that google seems to have forced on us without notification I have manged to lose the ability to access and add to my previous blog...

You can still reach the archived postings of that on
http://credoconsultancy.blogspot.com/