This year for Lent I gave up sugar to remind me that I am human, and not God, and as a daily reminder that I am limited and not really in control of my life at all. There is nothing like denying yourself a Freddo to remind you how fragile you really are. However, in the last week, I have not needed to forgo chocolate to be reminded of my fragility: I think most of us are very now aware of the limits on what we can control. Every year for Lent I try to give something up and take something on. This year, I have tried to take on practices of peace, intentionally doing more things in my day which would cultivate in me a peaceful heart. I have been experimenting with these in the last three weeks
I have a voice but I can’t use it I have a story but I can’t tell it I have a testimony but I can’t share it Have you ever felt silenced? Silenced by fear, silenced by insecurity, silenced by pain, silenced by society, silenced by the past. Maybe you feel like you are holding your own hands over your mouth, stopping yourself from speaking out truth because silence seems safer. There is a time and a season for silence in all our lives: “For God alone, O my soul, wait in silence, for my hope is from him.” Ps 62:5 “Set a guard, O Lord, over my mouth; keep watch over the door of my lips” Ps 141:3 There is wisdom in silence but what about when we are made to be silent? When we are pressured by ou
“If feminism is just about your own empowerment, then that is not feminism, that is just capitalism in a fancy hat” claims Alice Fraser in her 2018 Melbourne Comedy Festival Act “The Resistance”. Writing slightly differently, but with a similar insight, Eve Tushnet reflects in the article “Everyone is Female” that “A feminism that’s only about gaining power inevitably embraces the abuse of power.” As I have pondered both of these quotes, I have come to think that their resonance points to our desire for a feminism that will bring each and every person to equality. But more than that, how often we find the feminsim offered to us, whether that be in pop culture, conversation or commercials, to
Tonight, I watched A Beautiful Day in the Neighbourhoodand there was a scene which made me think of Jesus. The movie is about famed children’s educator Fred Rogers, who ran a long-running television program. He was a Presbyterian minister who was commissioned by his church to use his gifts of music, singing and connecting with children, to work in the television industry. In the movie a man is dying and Fred Rogers leans over and whispers in his ear. The dying man seems to revive a little and gives a thumbs up and says “I certainly will.” Someone asks Mr Rogers what he said to the man. “I asked him to pray for me,” is the surprising response. He goes on to explain that a man that close to de
Some survivors of domestic violence found the recent article from The Gospel Coalition (TGC) hard to read. After some discussion and reflection I realised that, to us, it reads as an outsider looking in, who assumes her audience is only made up of outsiders. It seems to us that the goal of the article is to provide comfort those outsiders, who are failing to understand a tragedy. In itself this is not a bad goal to have. But at a time when victims and survivors are struggling, no comfort is found here for them, and sadly this article has the potential to compound the guilt and shame we feel. Almost by definition DV has never been about the victims. It has always been about how the rest of so
