Online Course Announcement :: Good. True. Pleasing.

“Finally, beloved, whatever is true, whatever is honourable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things…”
Philippians 4:8

And friends, there are true things,
    and worthy things,
        just and commendable things,
            and excellent things
        emerging
        from the heart of the ministry and leadership that is happening in these days.  

Dear One

The continuing rupture in our patterns of being and believing allows us a chance to voice the lament, and also to turn our gaze and minds to the surprise of what is actually good, true, pleasing. It allows some very good questions to guide our next chapter of discovery. One colleague recently identified that the focus has shifted from “How are we going to do this?!!" and "What’s going to happen tomorrow and next week…”, to “I wonder what faithful ministry could really look like for us in the coming year?”. What an excellent inquiry for a community of faith to hold.

At LeaderShift, we continue to pay attention to the places where online engagement is rewarding - where skills, spiritual practice, and theological reflection are deepening. Because of some of the beautiful and good experiences arising from recent programs, we are excited to repeat three online engagement sessions from LeaderShift partnerships.

Faith Leaders for Such a Time as This with Janet Gear and Rev Brian Thorpe is on the calendar again beginning June 16th. This is a chance to go deep into the questions of the moment, both theologically and personally. Register here now.

“During the month of May a highlight for me was the weekly meeting with Brian and Janet online. Their input was rich, conversations with others in the group were enlightening and the group facilitation was sensitively done. How fortunate we are to have this opportunity for ordered and lay people to learn together. Thank you.”

— Marion Best, 'Faith Leaders for Such a Time as This' participant

In the future, watch for the Stewardship Buzz – a hands on learning for small teams within a community of faith, and Nourishing the Soul of the Preacher – a small group geared towards the unique context of rural and remote ministry personnel to help you develop practices that build collegiality in the face of isolation, and find spiritual practices that support grounded worship leadership.

In the meantime, I want to share with you the outstanding work of our colleague, Blair Galston PMRC Archivist and his support of the Vancouver Japanese United Church community as they created and launched their website, www.vjucarchives.ca Enduring Faith. It's an excellent place of image and story that connects us more deeply to our shared history.

And I want to recommend the excellent work of the PMR First Third Ministry Network and their encouragement to equip ourselves for leadership with children, youth and families. Their upcoming series called the Spirituality of Play still has a few spaces left. You can register here: www.pmrfirstthirdresources.ca. What a worthwhile invitation to engage creativity at a time when imagination may be limited by the video-conference squares on your monitor!

So, as you rest this weekend and prepare for the coming week, may your conversations, prayers, writings and reflections hold lament and praise in tension – and may this tension allow Spirit to forward compassion and creativity in your leadership, as you serve your community.

Faithfully,
Allison Rennie
LeaderShift Director

Be attentive to the moment

Be attentive to the moment.

I admit it, even typing that sentence makes me bristle a bit. When we are stuck in such a bizarre moment: a moment moves from dull and difficult, to sabbath-worthy and grace-filled and then back to panic-scrolling the latest news in a matter of seconds, well, being attentive might be the least desirable thing on offer.  

 Yet as a people of the way, we know that Jesus invites us to be so attentive to the world that we let our hearts fill and break them too. In many ways, being attentive to this time demands no more and no less than what our faith always asks of us: to draw from our tradition, to respond everyone with God's generous love, to speak prophetically to injustice and to work together to bring about the Kin-dom here on earth.  

 LeaderShift is playing its small part in supporting your work. We’re currently offering time to gather with Rev Janet Gear and Rev Brian Thorpe to explore the spiritual questions that arise during a crisis, the theologies that are guiding us, and how we respond to the needs of our communities right now. Also available are pastoral learning circles so wisdom and learning can be shared among colleagues. Following the feedback from all those who took the mental health first aid training, we have engaged Tipping Point to offer training on how to do pastoral care in a trauma-centred time.  

As we continue to respond to this time, we want to hear from you. What are you learning? What is alive about your faith these days? And what might you need to support your work as a faith leader in your community? Continue to reach out to us as we move, preach, teach and learn in this time. 

  With every blessing,  

  Rev Rhian Walker  

This Week. These Hours. Pray them –

Many of us from the Pacific Mountain Region were transformed during our trip to Inhabit last year.   

There we heard so many stories about 'coming alongside what God is doing in the neighbourhood'.

This article picks up similar calls to incarnation, to being rooted in place, and not merely re-creating Church an merely another attractional, or consumer choice.

This is important to recall when it comes to who we live into our present situation as a church in physical isolation. For, as the article notes, what we do now will shape our future as the post-pandemic Church.  

If we now move to create virtual church, if we merely produce more polished product, more disembodied 'virtual' communities-of-consumption, do we risk missing the point of being the blessed, counter-cultural and incarnational (and, I would add, this Holy Week 'cruciform') community of Christ?  

This writer warns us about leaning too heavily on our newly found technologies - lest we create patterns where we become 'passive consumers' of product and program instead of seeking God's reign by incarnating more deeply into each other's lives and the life of the world.  

I spoke yesterday to a clergy friend, who told me that when their former congregation decided to livestream, they talked about doing a media-blackout for those who lived anywhere within driving distance. "Only those who absolutely can't attend should watch from home", was their posture.

I'm not sure we need to be so hard line as all that, not even when this is all 'over' (I'm not sure things will ever be the same - but that's another article!). But I do think we need this challenge - and we need it now - to sharpen our ways of being Church. We need to  be conscious of we prayerfully adapt to the current situation.   

Even as we use technology to keep us connected, and even to offer word, sacrament and pastoral care -  what we will put in place now to challenge the potential for disembodiment and consumerism? How are we setting a foundation to be a distributed, connective, collaborative and high-participation Church?

What a beautiful challenge for us to discern at this time of crisis.

May we deepen our connections as we move into the Story of this Holy Week together.

- Rob  
--

(The Rev.) Rob Crosby-Shearer
LeaderShift Church Planting Project Regional Minister
The Emmaus Community and the Abbey Church
www.emmauscommunity.ca / www.abbeychurch.ca 
text / confidential voicemail 778 977 7562