Sunday... the first day... and it was good
We began this day with a slight shift in focus we left behind telling individual stories and began telling the story of this community here. We were challenged with a number of group activities that were designed to show us our strengths as a whole group. One activity in particular was extremely challenging and a bit complex to explain via this medium. What I will say is that after we completed it successfully we were told that this group was the first group to finish it successfully on the first try in the history of A&I! We were so encouraged by this that we did the exercise again and made it much harder to succeed... which we did! This group is a strong group of communicators.
We also discussed the nature of being a community and what that might look like for us. Judy lead us through a remarkable presentation about what a community is and how we live it. After lunch the participants wrote their covenant together. This covenant will be the guidelines by which we will live together for the next number of days.
Then Judy and the mentors lead the participants through a workshop on how to plan and lead worship. My portion was on "Sending Forth" and I have published my comments on the web if you are interested - click HERE.
After supper we were sorted into our smaller groups for better conversation. We engaged in three small group challenges which tested our communication, leadership, sharing and reflection skills. One of the challenges we completed surprisingly well, I was a bit worried about it but we succeeded brilliantly. Again it is a bit complex to explain but what we had to do was: two of us had to communicate without speaking about a thing to be built, two of us had to interpret what was being communicated, and two of us had to build this thing while blindfolded. Tricky stuff but our small group rose to the challenge.
The evening concluded with a Eucharist and Covenant Liturgy. As the only priest who is here I had the honour of gathering the community around the table of the Lord. The liturgy was a bit unorthodox and extremely powerful. Never before has such a simple celebration of the Eucharist been so powerful for me. Words fail me at present but I hope that I will be able to write about it soon.
This group, I am learning, has the capacity to be something that will go forth from this place and change the world - by beginning with themselves and spreading outward to the world they inhabit.
Thanks be to God for being called to be in this place at this time!
We also discussed the nature of being a community and what that might look like for us. Judy lead us through a remarkable presentation about what a community is and how we live it. After lunch the participants wrote their covenant together. This covenant will be the guidelines by which we will live together for the next number of days.
Then Judy and the mentors lead the participants through a workshop on how to plan and lead worship. My portion was on "Sending Forth" and I have published my comments on the web if you are interested - click HERE.
After supper we were sorted into our smaller groups for better conversation. We engaged in three small group challenges which tested our communication, leadership, sharing and reflection skills. One of the challenges we completed surprisingly well, I was a bit worried about it but we succeeded brilliantly. Again it is a bit complex to explain but what we had to do was: two of us had to communicate without speaking about a thing to be built, two of us had to interpret what was being communicated, and two of us had to build this thing while blindfolded. Tricky stuff but our small group rose to the challenge.
The evening concluded with a Eucharist and Covenant Liturgy. As the only priest who is here I had the honour of gathering the community around the table of the Lord. The liturgy was a bit unorthodox and extremely powerful. Never before has such a simple celebration of the Eucharist been so powerful for me. Words fail me at present but I hope that I will be able to write about it soon.
This group, I am learning, has the capacity to be something that will go forth from this place and change the world - by beginning with themselves and spreading outward to the world they inhabit.
Thanks be to God for being called to be in this place at this time!
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