Greetings to everyone. Hope your studies for the module are going well. Do feel free to post any questions or topics for discussion here!
I have had a request which I thought some of you might be interested in. If you subscribe to the College of Preachers magazine, you may have seen the article in the last issue in which Duncan Macpherson records a 'preaching seminar' held with a group of students. They worked together sharing insights on a group of readings for a particular Sunday, and ideas for how they would preach on that Sunday in their own context.
Duncan, who is the features editor of the magazine, has asked if I would contribute a similar article along with a group of students for one of the issues of the magazine next year. The format will have to be a bit different from the one in the current magazine, I think, as we would be sharing ideas (largely) at a distance. However, I would be delighted to hear from any of you who would like to be involved in this. It is just the kind of exercise which should, I think, feed our own preaching - as well as giving you food for thought in your reflection for the module.
The day for which sermon(s) would be prepared would be the feast of Pentecost (23 May) and the texts are Acts 2:1-11 and John 20:19-23. The editor's deadline for receiving my collated 1750-word write-up of the 'seminar' is Jan 17th, so we would have to be doing this over the next couple of months.
I am keen that this should not be an onerous extra for anyone; I imagine the main focus for online discussion would be the contribution of insights into the texts and possible messages for Pentecost 2010 arising out of individuals' own contexts and situations. If you could let me know within the next week - either by replying to this post, or emailing me - whether you would be interested in this project, I would be very grateful, and would then let you have a proposal as to how we could best proceed.
In the current edition of the magazine, a version of one of the students' short homilies was reproduced in the magazine at the end. We could do this - but then it is still a long way from Pentecost, and we might all feel we wanted to wait till nearer the time to finalize what we might say on that day! So - the format of the whole thing is quite open, and I would value any suggestions.
All best wishes
Stephen
Thank you, Eleanor! Yes, I would be delighted for anyone to join in this. When I've had a few more takers, I'll try to get the ball rolling properly.
Looks as if (understandably) most people are too busy preparing for Christmas (and/or doing Masters assignments!) to be thinking about Pentecost! I will get something together myself but if you (Eleanor) or anyone else would like to post any thoughts about these texts, about the way you respond to them, and especially about possible points of connection with your local church/community context, that would be great and I can feed them into the article.
A reminder of the two texts - Acts 2:1-11 and John 20:19-23.
Best wishes