(With apologies to those who didn't come and are sick of all the talking about it)I thought I'd make a space on the blog for people to share some of their highlights from GB; what they enjoyed, learned, times of encountering God.
I came across two very interesting articles in the Guardian today. I think that both should be generally of interest to sofachurchers even if you didn't get to the festival.
A very English revolution - In Greenbelt we see a new style of Christianity, defined by the idea that the modern world is a resource rather than a threat.
An atheist goes to Greenbelt - What happened when we sent a staunch atheist to a Christian arts festival to talk with evangelicals? Can Jessica stay out of the arms of Jesus?
Also making the news was the revealing of the results of a survey to find the 10 worst Bible verses:
The Bible's bad bits: silent women, mass murder and a weary concubine.
10 comments:
I hope you all had a really fab time.I'm sure I will get to hear about it at some point. C x
Thanks Andy - only just spotted this what with all my upheaval and transatlantic replanting.
What about SofaChurch folk? No one's saying much and it seems there's an enormous amount of mixed feeling on it!
My over-riding feeling was disappointment, but only because doing GB with a toddler is a very different experience to going without kids.
We've been for years pre-Kitty and loved the laid back 'do what you want-when, kicking back outside the tent with a beer or two and putting the world to rights into the small hours' experience that it used to be.
Now, it's rather more a case of queuing for an hour to get into a talk you really want to hear then having to leave after 3 minutes as your little one would much rather have you pushing her around a damp bumpy field in a Little Tykes car.
So a bit disappointing for me, if I'm honest. Next year I need to be more realistic about my expectations and go not expecting to get along to anything good.
All that said, I think God 'found me' in spite of my grumpiness. I recall a moment when I was sitting very begrudgingly in a children's worship event (one I used to mock pre-Kitty) with tears streaming down my face as the guy with the guitar at the front sang about how God loved us just as we were.
It was suddenly extremely moving and overwhelming fact to know for some strange reason! So that was a rather lovely thing.
Thanks for starting the discussion on this. I have been trying to find a way to express how I felt about Greenbelt.
I think that the childrens work was the main stumbling / disapointment for austin and I. Having done new wine for 2 years and having no children at all morning and evening we were expecting similar. While the kids work was good it didnt pay any attention to times of talks etc. New wine would base all their teaching times and worship times around the time that the kids work was on. It meant that we could get to all of something and not just half.
I didnt find any talks that I was paritcularily interested in and we struggled with the queing involved. I spent most of the time in my tent because I struggled with the amount of people- person issue!
We've thought about it a lot and have decided that next year we will probably go to New Wine again. It suits us more, and is longer and much more kiddie friendly. Hoping to take a group from st andrews.. booking next week!!
Yeah, I think I'd agree - Greenbelt doesn't seem to be geared around the kids. I think it's maybe best for families with young teens who are happy to spend all day skateboarding or knocking about in a crowd of friends, that sort of thing.
And I agree with the overwhelming-ness of all the people. There are very few places to go and be quiet or alone; there are some, but you only discover them after several years of GB-ing, I think!
I did find some of the talks very interesting; I went to one on shopping addiction that was perfect for me, and another on how we can protect our kids from technology overload by an author whose books I'd enjoyed.
But I sometimes find the talks a bit over my head; I guess they have to cater for all tastes and 'thinkings'.
I do love the 'anything goes'-ness of the place though. It'll always be a special place for me for that reason. I love that it's okay for things not to be black and white but actually very very grey.
And having been (rather painfully) chucked out of a church in the past, I love the inclusiveness and tolerance you find there. My heart just soared to see the lesbian, gay and bi marquee packed with people enjoying having a drink with folk traveling a similar path.
I'm so glad you've both commented, because I've been feeling horribly guilty about the sense of disappointment I felt too!
I think basically my expectations were way too high and there was no way it was going to be the experience I was hoping for when I had children with me.
I agree with Emma about the timings of the children's work, and would like to add that the queueing-for-tokens system seemed completely insane to me!
I sat down with the programme in the car on the way in and got really excited about the breadth of stuff on offer, but very quickly realised that almost none of it would be at all possible to get to! It was like being shown a lovely box of delicious chocolates, and then not being able to eat any of them!
Having said that, I loved the Iona Big Sing, which I was only able to get to by taking my son with me and relying on friends to babysit my daughter (thank you!). Thankfully, son loved it too. :-) And I got to a really interesting workshop on adoption on the Monday morning which I thoroughly enjoyed and it gave me a lot of food for thought, some of which I am still chewing over now.
In general, though, I had to lower my high expectations extremely quickly, and didn't adapt well to that which was my own fault. There was a lot of shouting and growling and stomping and I apologise to the poor people who had to put up with Helen-in-a-very-bad-mood for a sizeable part of the weekend! *ashamed grin*
If I ever go again, all of my children will be teenagers and able to go off on their own and do whatever they want, while I go off on my own and do whatever I want - if they coincide then fantastic and we can do it together, but with the children they age that they are right now, the adults and children's programmes simply don't coincide at all and it was quite frustrating.
I did enjoy getting away from Crewe for a few days, loved sleeping in a tent and spending time with good (patient!) friends in a totally different environment. I didn't feel I engaged with the whole 'Greenbelt experience' many times at all over the weekend, and was feeling rather miserable and guilty that I was clearly the wrong sort of person for it - but hearing from Suse and Emma makes me feel a lot better and maybe it's just the wrong time in my life to appreciate it!
I am very tempted to sign up for New Wine next year too with the St Andrews lot - it sounds as though that will fit our family situation better while the kids are still young.
Thank you so much for the opportunity to go and I learned a lot about myself while I was there, though it wasn't at all what I was expecting to gain from Greenbelt, valuable lessons were learned!
Ooh Suse and I were commenting at the same time, and reading her second comment I am reminded of the other thing I really loved, the inclusiveness (inclusivity?) of the place. That was a huge plus for me.
I'm sorry that others didn't, but I had a nice time!
I enjoyed hearing Rob Bell, Gene Robinson, John Bell and others talk. I find it very refreshing to have other people teach the sort of Christianity that I love, and very rarely gets aired. I also really liked the beatboxer Shlomo, and have had great fun this week at school showing pupils some videos of him and convincing them that I am him (we look a bit alike).
I am sorry to hear it was such a letdown for you, Helen, that is a shame. With all the preparation and work that's involved in getting the family ready for a camping trip, it's a bonus if it's well worth it all when you get there.
It looked like the kids had a lovely time, so that's good at least. Perhaps some nice memories for them.
I actually found myself this year feeling that it was all a bit too Christian for me, which is possibly a bad sign, given that it must be the least Christian of all the Christian festivals.
That said, there's no alternative for me. I've cried through a very charismatic Bible week in Wales and twice barely survived the 'you WILL be happy'-ness of Spring Harvest... At least at GB it's kind of okay to slink around and not talk to anyone. ;o)
p.s To Helen:
No need AT ALL to feel guilty for your feelings, btw. :o)
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