Wednesday, March 26, 2014

How Jonah swallowed Noah - or something...

Thinking about the upcoming movie Noah, I recall a comment made by our Theological College Principal in the 1950s about Cecil B de Mille’s The Ten Commandments. “Father” Hames said that movie would probably confirm pagans in their paganism and Christians in their Christianity.

 I feel somewhat  the same about Noah. Except that the re-telling of most ancient myths doesn’t  do much  for my faith. So it was with a little unease that I attended our new local church where Sunday’s service was to feature the Trinity Puppeteers presenting Jonah and the Whale.

I needn’t have worried. The Muppet-like characters emphasised the mythological context, the story was imaginatively and amusingly told; the presentation thoroughly professional; and the whole absolutely entertaining. Our presbyter followed up with a brief but forthright introduction to the issue of truth in parables and four or so points of relevance for our lives today.

In the context of the community of faith, this old story rang some bells for me. Thanks, Trinity. Perhaps you could have a go at Noah?

Friday, March 21, 2014

Worst Unpacking Ever

Well, we've arrived at the Retirement Village and taken over our villa. Just about everything is unpacked and roughly sorted in the rather smaller space we have at our disposal. We have even been away for a brief holiday to catch our breath, And we've made another trip back "home" to collect some important stuff that got left behind.

Everyone is very welcoming here and the villa is absolutely lovely, having been completely refurbished. But of course it's pretty difficult finding our way through our stuff. Things have got re-arranged into all kinds of new alliances and all of them are in unfamiliar locations.

The worst of it for me is the very means of putting together a brief post for the blog. The computer has been reloaded with Word 7 and after two months of inactivity and two weeks of slightly functional use it still needs another 17 programs installed before it will do what I need. And meanwhile, it can't even cope with the few basic things I have got into it so far.

Locating my best shoes and socks is a cinch compared with finding a file in this wretched beast.