Jon Reid’s posted a thoughtful piece about Iraqi prisoners and the monster lurking inside each of us over at blog one another: The Monster at Abu Ghraib.
Definitely ++ Lord, have mercy. Christ, have mercy. ++

Just read Culture Watch – Bob the Builder. My simple faith in Bob and the gang deconstructed in a few minutes of reading.

Bob’s relationship with his workforce of machines has also prompted much discussion as to the socio-political leanings of the programme.  Is Bob representative of the entrepreneurial ideal of capitalism, as he monopolises the construction needs of his community?  Or perhaps his willingness to share the work and rewards with his happy band of misfit machines points towards a more egalitarian view of a society structured for the sake of the many rather than the privileged few.  Every episode of the programme passes comment on the society that Bob finds himself a part of, and his attempts to improve the way things are.  Bob has a wide social vision, but whether he works to reinforce and prop up a crumbling world order, or to usher in a glorious new age remains unclear.

See the link above for the full text.

Prodigal’s been blogging a bit about desert spirituality over at: Prodigal Kiwi Blog: Another Desert Story.

The spirituality of the desert fathers and mothers has interested me since I was introduced to it in a Christian spirituality paper a few years ago. In one particular exercise our lecturer had pinned various sayings from them around the room (with each one having an image attached to them). For an hour or so we wandered from saying to saying until we found one we wanted to meditate upon and then sat or stood by that one.

I’ve also used their sayings when introducing people to different types of prayers. In a similar fashion I pinned a wide range of prayers around a large room and had people move about them reading and thinking about their content and style. Some desert sayings were included along with Kiwi psalms, various prayers from the NZ Prayer Book and other sources from around the world.

I often come back to the desert fathers and mothers. Just flicking through, seeing something, reading, thinking and then moving on. In some ways it’s a journey into an alien environment and in other ways it connects deeply. And it’s the short, pithy stories of real life and faith. This saying has always struck me from sayings about prayer.

Abba Lot went to see Abba Joseph and he said to him, “Abba, as far as I can, I say my little office, I fast a little, I pray and meditate, I live in peace and as far as I can I purify my thoughts. What else can I do?” Then the old man stood up and streched his hands toward heaven; his fingers became like ten lamps of fire and he said to him, “If you will, you can become all flame.”

If you hunt on the net then there are various collections of sayings, information and images out there on desert spirituality. (Search with Yahoo rather than Google as the Google search seemed to index bookshops for the first 100 entries).

• The Desert Hermits
• Desert Fathers
• Sayings of the Desert Fathers
• Sayings of the Desert Fathers (2)
• The Paradise of the Desert Fathers

Pray, meditate, feed, rest.

I’m lecturing next week on the Christian hope for creation. (Specific title “Cosmic Eschatology”). It reminded me of this meditation that I’ve used before by Terry Falla that draws us back to God as creator and sustainer.

Alpha and Omega

Before galaxies burned in empty night,
planets hurled through deepest space,
waves broke upon primeval shores,
volcanoes roared with molten rock;

Before lightning split an angry sky,
glaciers cut through tortured steeps,
flowers danced in zephyr winds,
streams chattered by forest glades,

You were already God.

And when in unimagined aeons
the earth ignites in flames of dying sun;
or missiles flash to cities doomed,
ash drifts, boughs break, unheard, unseen,

You will still be God.

Christ risen, what futile, cold assurance,
if he were not our God! But Alpha, cosmic,
crucified, he comes in grace confounding:
Omega, Father, Saviour, Friend;

Our Judge, our Breath, our Joy.

From: “Be Our Freedom, Lord.” by Terry C. Falla (p.42)

A good, thought provoking article in this week’s Listener by David Young on the lack of Pakaha ritual and spirituality in relation to the land. He argues that Pakeha may try to meet as equals in a bicultural setting but that they have lost the knowledge and practice of ritual that would allow them to contribute as participants rather than observers.

Have a read and a think about it: NZ Listener | A spiritual bypass by David Young

Hurricanes 37 bt. Crusaders 20

Still got that warm glow inside.

More of the glorious event at: tvnz.co.nz | SPORT | RUGBY | Hurricanes give Crusaders a fright

I’ve been reading (and reading) about different people’s models or descriptions of science-religion interaction over the past few months. In the last week I was following up some of Willem B. Drees’ work and came across this poetic creation story he wrote to introduce his book Creation: From Nothing Until Now. It ends like this,

In us
    our heritage,
    matter,
    information,
    and a box
    full of stories.
Between
    hope and fear
    our neighbors
    life
    here on Earth,
between
    hope and fear
    the great project
    of thought
    and compassion
on a road
    of freedom.

The full text is here: A creation story.
I like the idea of humans comprising, in part, stories.

Or more particularly the implications of gender for robot design and human-robot interaction: Robot Sex.
Must be Robot Week out there on the web.

Recent article on the use of robots for the care of the elderly. Early work so far, working on supporting those with failing memories, but I remember seeing a video of Pearl (the robot in question) last year and it looked promising.

Robot helps elderly with personal care.

Video clips available at CMU/Pitt Nursebot Project.

Doing some surfing around the science and religion web sites on the net and came across this recent article by Paul Davies posted at Metanexus: Metanexus Institute: Into the 21st Century.

It’s an interesting (and quite readable) opinion piece on science and religion interaction as we move into the next century. It’s worth a read if you’re interesting in this sort of thing (or even if you’re not).

Religion faces extraordinary challenges in the 21st century. Dazzling advances in science and technology have transformed our world view and produced dramatic changes in lifestyle and material wellbeing. But this enormous progress has left religion behind. Few theologians have kept up with the revolutionary developments at the forefront of astronomy, physics, molecular biology or genetics. Churches and other religious institutions seem ill-equipped to deal with the brave new world of big bang cosmology, quantum reality, genetic engineering and nanotechnology. As a result, many people see religion on the defensive against the onslaught of scientific progress. They think of science as undermining or displacing religion.