sustain:if:able kiwi

three month “project” anniversary

It seems a most appropriate marker

of three months of hard labour on our “project” ready for pick up by the Council tomorrow morning. It includes urine stained carpet from two rooms, a gutted entrance way, gib and ceilings into family room, back entrance way and a bedroom.

It’s had moments of unexpected spirituality – a perfumed blessing and renovation spirituality.

Tomorrow the electricians return and if things go well, we might have lights that switch on and off in the family room, back entrance way and one of the bedrooms.

On Friday the electricians found yet another surprise. The service fuse (from the road to the house before it gets to the metre board) kept tripping. ETSA was called, lots of head scratching and the fault was eventually traced to the presence of wires attached to the power line incoming from the road, with the potential to draw (sans) power into the roof cavity.

Not sure if that’s an entry for my Dictionary of Everyday Spirituality in that – other than the risks some people are willing to take (attaching wires to live 240 volts), in order to pursue their indoor gardening hobby.

my study leave world

This is what my world has been reduced to … the lived experience of everyday people (Cityside survey data) being placed alongside mission, methodologies of how to read living experience, theories of curation. Locked in a concrete box called an office, removed from distractions, my world is now smaller, yet, strangely, larger.

feel the seasons change

Today marks a personal and vocational transition for me. From 1 April to 1 July I’m on study leave, three months break from teaching to read and write.

As Faculty at Uniting College, we gain 6 months study leave after every three years of service. I was due to take this in Semester 1, 2013. However, with my appointment as Principal, which begins 1 July, it would have meant that 6 months after I became Principal, I would have been absent for 6 months. Which is not ideal. So the suggestion was made that, for the sake of leadership at the College, that this be split into two 3 month blocks, with one taken before I start.

So of the next three months, I am based on Adelaide, head down, writing. My major project is a book on emerging church sustainability. This builds on my PhD research, which explored in (great) detail an emerging church in Auckland, New Zealand. Last year, I returned to the same church to repeat the research. This provides what I think is a world-first, an close up inspection of an emerging church over a 10 year period. My hope is to turn this data into a book, tentatively titled “Emerging ten years on”, yielding important insights around leadership, continuity and sustainability.

I also have a number of smaller projects I want to play with – turning my recent mission conference presentations into written pieces available as internet accessible downloads, either as “singles” or as an “album” – tentatively titled “Feelings of Jesus and the mission of God.” I also want to paint an icon, as a way of reflecting on the change of role I am undergoing.

Then in December-March 2012 (3 months plus 3-4 weeks for holidays), I hope to go to the UK. I’d like to base myself (and family) within a UK College training missional leaders. (I’m having a conversation or two about this, but nothing definite has emerged yet).

I’m happy to speak to groups about the data emerging from “Emerging ten years on.” I also want to extend the research – specifically by re-interviewing the 10-15 UK emerging church communities I interviewed back in 2001.

So this morning, rather than head to the office, I’m at home. I’ve turned off my google calendar. What has been so jam packed for the last few months, is now basically empty. I’ve loved being able to say no to basically every speaking invite for the next 3 months.

Although I can’t quite start writing yet! There are still a few things in the “in” tray – some assignments, some Masters processes that need to be enacted.

finding voice, losing mine!

Today I spoke to Catholic Education, to about 120 staff, gathered for a day of annual retreat, providing the keynote input over about 90 minutes. In discussion with the organisers, I spoke on the theme of “Finding Voice, telling stories.” It was a slight adaptation of a presentation I gave back in September last year, to the Australian Religious Press Association, which seemed to go well, both then, and again today.

I began by using a film, The King’s Speech,

because I have a voice

to open up the topic of how we find voice, individually and as communities. Then under 3 headings I explored

• a theology of finding voice – Moses, Elijah, the short ending of Mark (16:8), then drawing on The Divine Voice: Christian Proclamation and the Theology of Sound and Sense Making Faith Body Spirit Journey

• finding voice today – some contemporary cultural analysis, including the way that Douglas Coupland, in 1991, in Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture, focuses on telling stories as a way of finding voice, and then returns to that theme some 19 years later, in Generation A: A Novel.

• three stories of finding voice that inspire me, to conclude (specifically the Parihaka story, Brooke Fraser and Paul Kelly).

As I spoke, I pondered the irony – that as I spoke on finding voice, I was losing mine. You see, today was my last public speaking engagement for the next 3 months. From 1 April to 1 July, I am on sabbatical and I’ve been able to politely say “no” and “sorry”, to a whole range of speaking, preaching and teaching, clearing space in order to focus on some writing. (More on the shape of that next week, when I actually start).

Which seemed to me, as I spoke, to be such an important irony to live within, the need to pause one’s mouth in order to think, process, reflect, read, re-stock. To find voice, but in a different way – with written, not spoken words!

house blog

We’ve set up a family blog, to chart the progress of our “project” – the house needing major renovations that we’ve recently brought. The blog is called “taylorskainga” – which is a Maori word for home, address, residence, village, habitation, habitat.

The blog will chart progress, with before and after shots. (Mostly before at this stage, cos while we’ve been working pretty hard, at times it feels like we’ve only just begun!). It’s hopefully an encouragement as we wade through the work.

Today was top coats on the ceiling of the family room, with the hope that by the end of the weekend, we can then move lots of the furniture currently stored in the garage into the house.

Tim Finn at Bird in the Hand winery

Team Taylor are off today to hear Tim Finn at Bird in the Hand winery. It’s a happy constellation of a number of threads.

• First, they make great wine at a great price.
• Second, Team Taylor love Tim Finn, with the lyrics from “Couldn’t Be Done” from the Imaginary Kingdom (2006 album) being often hummed among us.

We had no idea that it couldn’t be done
And we needed to find a like-minded someone
We had no idea that it couldn’t be done

• Third, its the first night concert for our two girls, and we’re hoping that this is a gentler introduction than some other night concerts could be.
• Fourth, it’s a long story, but I found myself in Perth over last weekend on what was actually my birthday. My excuse is that I tend by nature to think in days, not dates. So I looked at the Perth Summer Spirit event, thought that if I was speaking Saturday and Sunday, having a day off on Monday to go wine tasting would be a great way to remind myself of my humanity and the good things about life. The Perth end were booking the tickets, so I said go over Friday, return Monday. When the tickets arrived, I looked at the dates and realised Monday was my birthday. Duh!! So while it was a great way personally to have a birthday, for the sake of family celebrations, Saturday 25th was decreed my “2012 birthday.”

And what better way to spend it that listening to Kiwi music at a winery with my family.

a tonic at the end of a tough day

It had been a long, hot day. Team Taylor were tired. We’d been up late the night before collecting a Dad from the airport, up early for music practices, staying afterschool for extra-curricula activities.

We all wanted to just be home.

But the traffic was crawling down Marion Road. After stop starting for 30 mins, we decided to bail and pulled into a local pub.

We walked into this …

Monteiths. So iconic in New Zealand that one of our fridges, the fridge at our holiday house, is called Monty! Named after original West Coast of New Zealand beer.

On tap, here, local, in Australia ….

project progress: some first signs of life

A first sign of new life over the weekend at our house/project, with seeds germinating. They are a “cottage garden” mix, given to one of our kids in the “transition pack” we gave them as part of the move. Planted, last Sunday, protected by wire in case the 3 cats the previous owner has left behind try to take revenge, they are sprouting by our front deck.

They are a small sign of hope in what has been a week on the home front we would prefer to forget. The day we moved the builders decided to sand the gib, which meant all our stuff now sports a fine film of gib dust. The next day one of the subbies did a runner, with their replacement following suit a few days later. We are perched in the top part of the house, one of the kids sleeping on a sofa in the lounge, while we wait for the builders to finish. The other child has been sick, suffering asthma symptoms, trying to rest in a house filled with gib dust!

So finding even the tiniest sign of growth, the smallest sign of new life, is important.

I am using this post as a prayer, adding as a comment the initials of a person/place which today I want to experience life. You might like to pray with me, adding initials for a person or place in which you would like to see God breathe fresh life.

a day’s retreat with Uniting world

Today I am spending the day with Uniting World, who are the overseas mission arm of the Uniting Church of Australia. My task is to input into the 19 staff, who have gathered on retreat. (It means a long day, as they are meeting in Sydney, so a 5 am start, back in Adelaide by 7 pm).

I think I will frame my time with them around two questions.

First, what do we do with the word “mission”? I will tell a couple of stories that might be a window into the current mission state of the Uniting Church. One will reflect on how church folk are shaped today by their previous experience of mission, the other on our tendency to reduce mission. I hope that will provoke some discussion on how we frame, imagine and talk mission today.

Second, I will ask them about the Uniting Church Preamble, and what is the missiology embedded in it, and what that might mean.

I also have some global mission stories, which I have prepared as takeaway postcards, along with some recent non-Western mission thinking, which perhaps I might salt through the conversation.

I am not at all sure what and who I will find, and my brief has been fairly vague. So I’m feeling a tad nervous, but am praying that some connection points get made and that we all leave a little richer.

being 12: a birthday car-hunt

One member of Team Taylor turned 12 today. Being a Sunday, it meant a whole day to fill with pleasure and enjoyment. We decided to try and have a treasure hunt using the car. We identified 7 fun things/favourite spots. We then created a number (3 or 4) clues for each, from hard to easy. The challenge was to use the clues to identify the spot, which we then drove to, to enjoy a treat. Once enjoyed, the next “spot”/set of clues could be requested.

It turned out to be a fun and creative way to spend some time as a family celebrating a birthday. Here’s the clues, and I will put the answers in the comments. (It mostly took about 2 clues to guess the spot, although one confounded both children). (more…)

the project has begun: broken perfume bottles anyone

Back in November we put on an offer in on a house. It is a real mess. Two rooms are unfinished – no gib on walls or roof. Most other rooms have holes in the walls. No room is finished, apart from kitchen and bathroom.

But the place has character. And the bones are sound. And the carpentry is sound. And we’ve done a do-up before. And its better than renting in that we get to put our own pictures up and paint rooms the colour we want them and have pets. And we put in an offer at a price that meant we could afford a bit of carpentry help.

Because its a do-up we’ve given ourselves a few weeks to work on it before we move in. So we took possession on Saturday and have spent the weekend ripping up carpet (the owner had cats that wee’d inside) and cleaning. Plus the first coat of paint on the first ceiling.

Plus a few surprises. The owner had not quite left. And she turns out to be the owner of 16 cats. Yep 16. Not all are yet gone.

And, most wierd of all, as we ripped plywood off the ceiling tonight (yep plywood on the ceiling!), I heard something move in the wood above me. Once, twice, three, four times. One by one, out fell 4 perfume bottles, smashing onto the floor below. Glass everywhere and fine perfume wafting through the room.

Who on earth would board perfume into their ceiling? Or a sacrament of annointing?

and now we’re back. So hi ho, hi ho

32 days after we left for home/New Zealand/holidays, we’re back, in Australia, at home, and starting to think about the year ahead.

It promises to be a MOST interesting year. First, we move into our very own Australian “project” – a house that needs a LOT of attention! More on this in the coming days! I promise.

Second, come 1st of July, I start as Principal of Uniting College. I’m feeling pretty daunted by the title and the expectation and am intrigued by how that role will unfold over the latter half of the year.

Third, due to starting as Principal, it was decided just before Christmas that it might be wise for me to take some study leave before I begin. (I was due for study leave first semester of 2013, ie 6 months after I would have begun as Principal). So from April to June 2012, I have three months to do some writing, followed by another three months December 2012 -March 2013.

A year of new house, new job and study leave. What impact will all this have on the old stress levels I wonder? Whatever might come, it certainly promises to be an event-filled year!

So, first things first, might as well head off to work tomorrow …

the summer project

It used to look like this …

now, after fun choosing the paint, then time spent engaging in the spiritual practice of undercoating, followed by three days of exhausting painting, this is the result …

one very satisfying summer project complete. Wish all my work was this instantly transforming, this instantly satisfying.

on a jet plane. tee hee

Team Taylor are on a jet plane, flying back to New Zealand for the summer. I have one more week of work, in which I hope to make significant progress on this little writing project, but with school ending for the kids on Wednesday, it’s time to reconnect with earth and people.

We are all very excited ….