A to Z of Bossey, presentation night

My final post on this blog. It's a presentation I wrote for group to do at our leaving ceremony. I passed by the way!!

Each student to read 1 letter

A to Z of Bossey 2012

A is for Arrival, thinking back to when we first got here, when all that is now so familiar to us was new and unknown

B is for Bossey, our chateau, with its classrooms, it's library, it's chapel and its wonderful views.

C is for Cultural differences, where do we begin... I think it is safe to say that living and working together has made the world seem a much smaller place, but at the same time highlights those differences that makes us unique

D is for Dialogue, whether its been in the classroom, over coffee, with each other, with visitors, with staff or with friends we have made outside of Bossey, we keep on listening and understanding.

E is for Ecumenism, well what can we say, our whole purpose for being here.

F is for Filioque, one of the first ecumenical issues we came across here, our way of understanding our faith isn't the same for everyone

G is for Geography, no longer having to look at google earth to check where a country is, because the chances are we know someone who lives there now!

H is for Hospitality, for everyone who fed us, looked after us and answered our queries, we thank you.

I is for Ignorance, what we may have started our journey with. Now we have gained knowledge, it's hard to go backwards. In the council for Interfaith dialogue discussion in Rome, they suggested we should enter in to dialogue with other faiths by listening so we could recognise their values and find common ground for cooperation. Fear and lack of knowledge often assist in fuelling prejudice. 

J is for John and the organic garden, for the fresh air, the hard work and the passion he developed in many of us

K is for Koinonia, for fellowship and togetherness in Christ, wherever we may be  in the world

L is for Lund principle - The Lund Principle is important in ecumenical relations between Christian churches. It affirms that churches should act together in all matters except those in which deep differences of conviction compel them to act separately.

M is for Myanmar and all the other countries represented here today

N is for Normality, what we are going back to, will life ever be the same after our time here? Should it ever be the same, if we are going to grow as Christians, all part of the journey

O is for Orthodox and other denominations, what we have learnt and how it will affect our ministry, lay or ordained in the future

P is for Petit Bossey, our home for 5 months.

Q is for Questions, how would we learn without them, as Bob Marley would say, emancipate yourself from mental slavery.

R is for Rome experience, still fresh in our minds, a week of worship and sightseeing, history and fellowship, a week never to be forgotten. 

S is for Students, father Ioan speech at the being of this course, if you put a group of Bishops together and tell them they are students, they will behave like students. 

T is for Taize experience, sharing in the spirituality of the place, coming together in prayer and silence

U is for Umbrellas, not just umbrellas, but the weather in general, from the warm weather in September to the snow in January, it was the first time some of the students had experienced it!

V is for Visible Unity, what we should continue to seek. it is a gift from God, it is our responsibility as humans to make it happen for all.

W is for the World Council of Churches, this provisional organisation which has and continues to do so much towards working for visible unity between us

X Is for the love shown to one another during our time together, forming friendships that will out live out time here.

Y is for Yahweh, Father, God, whatever name we use, God is at the centre of all our lives.

Zzzz is for sleep! The temptation maybe to leave here, return home and go back to sleep. But the reality is that this has been a life changing experience, and one we now need to go and live in the real world

Final day of prayer for the week of Christian unity

We are off to St Paul's outside the walls later for catholic vespers with the pope, it's the end of the week of prayer for Christian unity. Mary one of our students is reading a prayer.

Well is was like evensong in Bristol/Salisbury cathedral. Full choir and sung evening prayer. Differences were that the Pope was leading it, it was in St Paul's Basilica outside the walls, on the day we celebrate the conversion of Paul .the Archbishop of Canterbury representative in rome was present was present, they really know how to swing incense AND we had VIP seats right at the front....oh and I almost forgot an escort home which avoided all the traffic, but it was by luck that the coach in front needed to get some delegates back quickly to continue a dialogue meeting and we just happened to be behind them!!
It was a beautiful service in Italian, but we had a book with the translation in English, I really felt I could enter into the spirit of worship, which I felt was lacking at the audience with the pope.

This was really the last key day of the trip I think, we wine to visit Vatican radio which, was a huge affair, we're not talking some little hospital radio set up, we're talking a business that is broadcast all over the world in 40 different languages.

Sunday was an interesting end to the week, it was a bit of an anticlimax really. The catholic church and especially the Pontificate Council for Promoting Christian Unity really worked hard for us all week, we met all manner of departments, we met communities involved in world ecumenical work, attended vespers with representatives from many Christian denominations, we were also taken to meet the  Waldensians. But on the last morning we were invited to attend a Mass in a parish church with a lunch afterwards, it was a happy occasion with young church members receiving bibles as gifts, some of us were asked to help hand out the bibles with the Cardinal and others were asked to read, but when it came to communion, we couldn't receive and although I understand the reasons why, it seemed the wrong thing to end the week of Christian unity with. At Bossey we don't share communion services together, we are encouraged to go to churches and join theirs, but because we don't do communion, nobody is excluded. In this Catholic Church on this Sunday morning, I felt excluded....

And yet I was only justifying this to myself a few days before we came to Rome. We are united through Christ as one church in Christ, if we choose to practice rituals in different ways, and be many churches that make up the one church in Christ, does it really matter in the big scheme of things?

Day 3...

We started today with the department of migration, this included all people's with no fixed address or those not living at it for an extended period, including travellers, refugees, immigrants and overseas students. I think they said there was 8 million overseas students worldwide, Australia is becoming a key centre for this. It was interesting and engaging, there was a variety of speakers and lots of questions.
The under secretary of the council justice and peace spoke to us after the break. The talk was hard work because of her accent but the content was good. There were very few women in high positions in Vatican jobs, yet she could only ever be the undersecretary, not the secretary for a council.

We visited the Catacombs in the afternoonand then went  off to the Focalare movement for a talk and dinner. Movements are different to religious orders in that you don't have to live in community to be part of it. Some of the members we met were young people, some married and some who did live in community. The idea is that they give back to the society they live in, they work, they love and they help in whatever way they feel called. They are asked to give most of their income to the movement and live off only what they need depending on their job and circumstances. There are Focalare movements all over the world, it would be interesting to meet the community in the UK.

We were out for 15 hours on this day, and its starting to take its toll.

Rome day 2, an audience with the Pope.

This feels so surreal! I'm sat in the 3rd row of the auditorium waiting for the pope. The atmosphere is almost 'rock concert' like. 4 of our students have been chosen to greet him, Aris, Todi, Tania and Rebecca. I'm feeling mixed emotions, almost tears, but also a feeling of 'what am I doing here'. Not that I wouldn't have come, you really don't get this chance every day.
I wait with trepidation for his arrival at 10.30!
Different groups are arriving and entering playing as a marching band, others suddenly stand up and start playing. And a group of nuns were dancing and clapping
Now they are reading out the names of all the groups present here.

Now we are off on a sight seeing bus tour, many basilicas, starting with St Peters....

Just got into bed at 22.50, after leaving the guest house at 8.30 this morning! We have visited, 4 Basilicas, including St Peter's, St John Lateran, and St Mary Major. We will be doing the 4th main one on Friday, that's St Paul's outside the wall.
Then we stopped to look at the Colosseum and a 2000 year old roman road, after that we went to St Bartholomew's  on Tiber Island, a martyrs church, and we finished with catholic vespers in Santa Maria in Trastevere after which we got fed at 9.00 O'clock.
It was a good day and I would never have done all of the sights without a guide, but it was definitely one church too many, or maybe one would have been enough! It was a bit of a case of seen one, seen them all!!!

Rome - study visit day 1

I'm in Rome and I had no reason to be stressed! I'm in a single room with its own ensuite, it's better than the accommodation I have been staying in for the whole of my time in Petit Bossey. And the food tonight was delicious, it's getting used to a different order of food to Switzerland, it's pasta, then meat and vegetables with salad, then dessert. They also bring around cheese to go with the meat, as opposed to Switzerland which is salad then a main course which may include pasta or rice.
Anyway I'm a happy bunny on my first night here, I wasn't looking forward to sharing a room for 6 nights, but there are advantages to being the eldest female in the group!

We have spent the morning with the Pontificate council for Christian unity, the council for interfaith dialogue and the superiors council for religious orders. I was expecting it to be a very long morning, but the variety of speakers, all ordained men or men and women in religious orders was good and they ensured we moved about and had breaks. All in all a good morning.
This afternoon was the visit to the Necropolis, the city of the dead. We walked under St Peters Basilica, and made our way past the bones of St Peter still sitting in the graffiti wall where they were positioned from their original burial site, which we also walked past. Directly on top of this site is the altar of St Peter's, for this reason only the Pope is allowed to celebrate mass here, because he is considered a direct descendant of St Peter.
It's been an excellent day, I plan to write and read tonight. The week will be manageable at this pace as long as I rest in the evening.
Father Louis, a priest originally from Canada and working in the council for Christian unity is an excellent guide and very approachable.

Time's running out!

It's been a long time since I've written for my blog. Since I have returned after Christmas it has been constant essay writing and revision for exams, oral exams! Except for foreign languages I don't think oral exams are practiced in the UK. But in a weird sort of way I quite enjoyed them. I was extremely anxious, more about the unknown than about revising for them, and I haven't had to revise since my ABPI exams 14 years ago! Yet being able to talk through your answers, and justify your own opinions seemed a good way to be examined in theology.
Anyway they finished last Thursday, and since then I haven't stopped. I've been out for coffee, lunch, dinner and I've been to a skiing resort. This has all been with people I have met at the little Anglican Church I attend in Gingin. Tomorrow I'm leading evening prayer because Carolyn the priest in charge is a way for the weekend, it'll be my last Sunday at Gingin, so it's a real opportunity to thank everyone.
On Monday we go to Rome for a study visit, it has been made very clear to us that this is what it is, it is not a tourist visit. Paid for and organised by the Vatican during the week of prayer for Christian unity and with an audience with the pope, it's going to be quite a week. I plan to blog daily if we have WiFi  if not, I'll write daily and blog it all at the end of the week. The program is none stop all week from 8.30am until 10.00pm most days, we get a free afternoon on Saturday, I think we will all need to lie in a darkened room by then!