A partial picture

This afternoon I conducted for the Tuesday Group a special Advent service of reflection on the Great 'O' antiphons and the scriptures behind them - the images and poetry of hope in the coming of the Messiah. Taken from the riches of the ancient Divine Office, and woven into our Advent hymnody by Victorian divines with a deep cultural awareness of tradition, this material is part of what gets lost as common public memory of bible and hymnody weakens and fades. Tuesday Group members are of a generation brought up familiar with the Bible in a way that was already beginning to weaken when I was young. It would be good to find a way to deliver the same material to a much younger audience.

This evening was taken up with the annual Kidney Wales Foundation celebration of Christmas, This year we had a full house because the much media exposed choir 'Only Men Aloud' were taking part. And not only these fine guys, but also CF1, another local mixed choir with a fabulous way of doing spirituals and Gospel songs that really rocks the roof, and a thirty strong Welsh Primary School choir who not only sang well but were beautifully behaved and disciplined in a way that did nothing to inhibit their enthusiasm. It was otherwise very much a traditional lessons and carols event, with hymns and readings taken at a brisk pace, rather too brisk for me, but clearly to the satisfaction of everyone else present.

It's good that people are still willing to take part and hear the stories connected with Christ's birth read publicly, but inevitably the rich diet of scriptural material is reduced to seven or eight much repeated substantial narratives. The way things are nowadays, the story told is divorced from its foundations in Christian scriptural teaching. So it's no wonder that opinion poll surveys reveal a level of ignorance and imcomprehension about the deeper meaning of the message. What we do is better than nothing, but not really good enough.

Roy and Lynne, recently back from their first visit to Jerusalem presented me with a finely embroidered white Jerusalem stole. I shall wear it for the first time at the two December weddings I have coming up. Roy and Lynne were married two years ago at St John's on December 1st, and celebrated their second anniversary with a blessing in St George's Jerusalem - a place full of special memories for me. Even more so now that I have digitised all my photos from visits there in 1998 and 2000.

Day of resurrection

At the end of the morning Eucharists, there had been no visit to the scene of crime by anyone from the police, even though I met two local Community Support Officers yesterday and told them what had happened. They promised then, when we met at two in the afternoon, to check that an investigating officer had been assigned to make a visit. After all, we wanted to clear the damage and make things look presentable again. Faced with the mess, Pauline and I were bothered about doing nothing at all, as it looked so distressing to passers-by.

Brief discussion convinced us that it was right to get on with the job, carefully bagging the 'evidence' of the discarded alcopop bottle, to pass on if anyone did bother to contact us or just showed up from Central Police Station some time, and collect in the broken pieces to see if anything could be done with them.

One of Pauline's spare time interests is collecting Beswick china horses. She often buys damaged ones from eBay and does effective repairs on them. She was keen to see if she could do anything with the scores of tiny shards and bigger pieces, which had laid unexamined on the ground in the locked churchyard for thirty six hours.

When I arrived for evensong, she was there already, grinning with triumph. "Easy, all done and back in place", she said "Baby Jesus was only decapitated. It was the crib that shattered and took the force of the blow." I went to inspect, and was delighted to see that the figurine was resplendent on a bed of real straw lining a small brown papier-maché tray, such as supermarkets use to sell food products. If anything, it looked even better like this. Everyone at church shared the pleasure of the moment. "We couldn't let them win, could we?" She added, before we turned our thoughts to prayer.

You can't tell that the figure of Jesus is broken, lying there. But the story of the last 36 hours adds something extra, powerful and symbolic, to the meaning of this image of His birth.

I texted Steve from City Centre management when I got home from church to tell him the good news. Since we last spoke yesterday, he'd been in touch with Norman Sayer, Cardiff and South Wales' eminent local providor of roundabouts and big wheels for special occasions, to see if he could help with an emergency figurine. It turned out that Norman employs a professional model maker, as there's always repair work of this kind needed in fair-land. He was happy to offer to get a replacement figurine made. Someone else emailed me overnight in addition, and offered to pay for a new figurine. How quickly evil can be overcome by good!

There are times when it is impossible to see how any good can be drawn from evil situations. A small experience of this kind is what keeps the dynamo of hope turning over and shedding light in darkness.

Nativity vandalised

As I was preparing to leave for church to have another go at sorting out the office computer, prior to the lunchtime 'Oriana' concert, I had a phone call from Pauline to say that the nativity scene in the north tower churchyard had been vandalised overnight. The figure of baby Jesus in his crib had been wrenched from its mounting and smashed into smithereens against the step. A half drunk bottle of alcopop had been discarded on the ground in front of the crib - a calling card? I wondered. This bottle was the first piece of rubbish discarded in this churchyard in the three weeks since the crib was erected, contrary to pessimistic expectations of some people around the place. Well, we'll see what the police have to say about fingerprints and DNA on the bottle in question. I reported the incident immediately, with just this in mind. And then I emailed the Media Wales newsroom.

That the figure of Jesus had been smashed and all other figures left intact is disturbing. This wasn't an arbitary attack by someone out of control. The culprit had to make the effort to climb over five foot spiked railings to get at the crib, as the gate was chained. Not easy, and a risky thing to do on one's own. Earlier in the day the 'Echo' had reported on Denzil John's 'Prayer for Binge Drinkers', and mentioned the service of crib blessing on Thursday night at which it was first used. Was this act a response to the article from someone reluctant to express their opinion and debate openly with Christians expressing their concern about the culture of excess and debauchery?

We're rather used to passing off such acts as being simple minded yobbery and high spirits. I say it bears the marks of a religious hate crime. Christianity is routinely mocked and derided in public. Advocates of the abolition of all religion do well from book sales and media appearances. Attacks on clerics and others, also places of worship of all faith communities are on the increase. Government legislation introduced on religious hate crimes is applicable across the board in relation to all faith communities. It's not a crime to think. But when alcohol or drugs loosens inhibition, hostile attitudes turn into actions, and outrages happen.

One thing was evident to me as a stood and surveyed the scene. Passers-by of all ages were shocked and angered. Regardless of the offence intended to religious people, there is something particularly offensive about smashing the image of an innocent helpless child - coming as it does in the weeks following the 'Baby P' case and the trial of the abductors of Shannon Matthews. This is not childish or adolescent naughtiness, it is much darker, revealing that just under the surface of our popular happily permissive tolerant culture, dangerous elements of ill-will are breeding, contemptuous of anything that seeks to nuture good-will, trust and respect.

When discussing all this with people in church before the concert, it was clear that this wasn't the first time in their long experience that something like this had happened, and been recovered from. "Never mind", said Dr. Percy, expressing his happy anticipation of the coming feast; "He'll be here again before long whatever else happens." That gave me an idea. Having managed to sort out the computer, I printed a notice to hang on the stable gable.

"Despite his enemies - Jesus is coming again very soon."

Meanwhile, the city centre management team has been informed of what happened, and will be on the case, acquiring a replacement figurine when business opens on Monday. Pauline will have a go at piecing together the broken bits of the baby pro tem. Already this is taking on a symbolic life of its own. These anti-religious fools just don't seem to understand - you can't kill a real story, about a real person, a good story, a story of good overcoming evil. And at a time like this, we need to remember this.

Nativity blessing

Yesterday, my good neighbour Pastor Denzil John of Tabernacle Baptist sent me a copy of a prayer he'd written, a prayer of intercession for those caught up in binge drinking. It was opportune to include this in a brief order of service devised for tonight's blessing of the outdoor nativity scene, along with prayers for the homeless. Then, this morning I emailed a copy with explanation to one of the 'Echo' reporters who takes an interest in city centre affairs, and soon got a positive response, with a request for Denzil's contact details. The thought of getting a little publicity for our brief ecumenical Christmas act of worship and witness was irresitible. And Denzil, as it turned out, was pleased to be asked.

When it came time to leave home to go to church, I couldn't find my backpack with my bike lights in, so I had to walk briskly, being unwilling to risk riding unlit on an evening when there were hundreds of cars and people in the avenue between home and church, assembling for the start of the Wales stage of the GB Motor Rally. Such a miscalculation made me late, and the band was not a little fed up at the delay in getting into church to warm up and have a cuppa, but we were able to start on time nevertheless.

About two dozen people representing all the churches, thankfully, arrived to join with the band of Grangetown Salvation Army Corps. No press - but I didn't really expect this at such short notice. I just want people around the city to know what we're doing, and take encouragement from it. As we began, the rain fell and the wind blew, so after the opening hymn and crib blessing, we retired inside the church tower base, which was just sufficient to accommodate the band and the congregation, for the remainder of the service.

Just as Captain Eric Smith began to read the nativity Gospel, that 'prehistoric garbage truck' (to quote Mark Knopfler) arrived for its noisy evening round, and stopped right outside while the wheelie bins were brought to it. Then a food delivery truck arrived and there was a fair amount of annoyed beeping and manouvering that went on, just twenty feet from where we were singing and praying, almost, but not quite, drowned out.

Then to crown it all, a lady in the corner fainted, came around, carried on singing, fainted again, and so on. I was hardly aware of this until someone called out during the singing of 'Silent Night' indicating the need for a chair, which meant going into church and hunting for one - they're all kept as far away from the door as can be - so it took longer than it need. Must remember to ensure an emergency chair is kept at the back in future. As we were nearing the end of the service, I thought it better to continue although distracted, to conclusion, rather than stop and have a situation where nobody knew what to do next or what was happening. There were several women supporting the afflicted lady, including a teenage first-aider among the Salvation Army members present - we shared their pride in this. A few minutes after we concluded, an ambulance showed up and she was taken off to hospital.

Even so, despite all the calamities of the night, we all toughed it out in a way the Salvation Army are more used to than the rest of us. We made our witness, and I managed to get some video footage to edit into another little record of a moment in our 'Season of Good Will' project. A lot more work is needed on the footage, but the rough cut is again posted on the project web page.

Encounter in faith

The Countdown 2009 board met this morning to receive updates from Focus groups. Some of them are now to be wound up have achieved their objectives. I feel as if we've only just begun to get into our stride as a faith focus group. There's so much more we need to do and progress is slowed down by the fact that many prominent faith community leaders are involved in initiatives relating to the Assembly Government, and are unwilling to give priority to city based initiatives which have a different focus and purpose.

The meeting received the draft report on city centre transport and the future of St Mary Street to be presented to the council tomorrow. The basic ideas remain unchanged - bus transport hubs distributed around the four points of the compass, linked by a free shuttle. It's a concept that meets with governmental favour. Raising the funding, especially nowaways, will be a challenge.

At the end of the afternoon I welcomed a group of sixteen women of the BME educational organisation 'Women Connect First', which came to us at the end of a day's tour of six places of worship belonging to Cardiff's faith communities. My task was to give them a brief introduction to Christianity and its practices. For many of them it was their first ever visit to a church, so lots of explanations of the many things social as well as religious which distinguish a church from a Mosque or a Temple were necessary.

All had noticed the outdoor nativity as they arrived and expressed their appreciation and delight to have it explained to them how Christians use images to tell the stories contained in scripture and tradition. The Muslim women of the group all knew about Mary, as he's in the Qu'ran, and also about John the Baptist to whose honour our building is dedicated, also in the Qu'ran. Even though the stories we have to tell about them are different, what we have in common is that we have stories to tell that are all part of God's story. They were a lively group, interested and full of questions.

I hope they enjoyed their session as much as I did.

Tech break

The office computer has been giving us some grief since both its RAM chips died on us last week and needed replacement. A few dysfunctional days of attempting to start the computer properly in order to diagnose a problem which didn't show up at the outset resulted in killing the link with the printer using Windows XP. After replacing the RAM, despite correct procedures followed, nothing would persuade these dumb beasts to converse, under XP.

Fortunately I'd set it it up as a dual booting machine with Ubuntu Linux as an alternative, operating system. The printer works at treat in black and white, under Linux, and apparently there are colour print drivers somewhere out there in cyber-land awaiting discovery. In fact the machine flies under Linux, and is much slicker and quicker to use from start up and to surf with. There's no hanging around waiting for Windows upgrades or anti-virus updates to finish hogging resources.

Why bother with Windows? Because it's what others are used to, and nobody wants to think too much about new uses and habit changes, even if they make life more manageable. At least until I can fix XP and re-marry it to the printer, Ubuntu use in the office is obligatory for both Philip and I. I'll be happy until I need a colour printout. Poor Phil is not happy with the extra effort required to learn to navigate the different desktop layout. There's not enough time for this, especially now at one of the busiest times of year.

It was super to take a break from all this, going to the Tuesday Fellowship Christmas Lunch at the Whitchurch Toby Carvery, and relaxing in good company for three hours in the middle of the day. It makes a change from queuing alone to snach a cheese and onion pastie at Greggs.

Piano launch

I had a meeting this morning with people from the school of media studies at Glamorgan University's Atrium to discuss collaboration on filming faith community events. I had hoped that by now we would have had a team to record some Christmas greeting videos for posting up on the BBC big screen, but neither part of this arrangement has worked out. There is, however, the future possibility of working with a student researching spirituality and the media, which should be interesting. As a result I've just got on with learning how to handle a video camera and how to edit footage. I've posted a few learner's rough cut examples on Google Video. They're accessible here

We had our first charity concert of the season tonight, in aid of the George Thomas Hospice, with about two hundred people present. We were treated to some fine singing, and some unusual modern harp music, played by Catrin Ffinch. The harp sounds wonderful in church. It's as if the place was built to cherish the sound of stringed instruments.

It was also the first outing for our new electric piano, a top of the range Roland, acquired through the generosity of a musical donor in the parish. It's an instrument of some substance, able to fill the building in the same way a grand piano does, making it very appropriate for accompanying choirs and soloists. For my taste, nothing compares to the sound of a living piano, but this instrument has the twin advantages of being portable and saving on the cost of tuning - which it never needs. In fact, the piano's tuning can be adjusted to match that of the organ, which differs from modern concert pitch. Anything that's low maintenance in church is a distinct advantage.

The new year begins

I love Advent Sunday, and the sense of a new beginning it conveys through the scriptures we read, the hymns and the prayers. We had a good turn out, around fifty adults and children for the Sung Eucharist, and by the end I felt filled with energy by the occasion, as opposed to drained - which makes a nice change.

Before the evening Carol service I took Communion to Hilda and Angela, patients in the Infirmary West Wing, and then went up to take Communion to Peggy in Cyncoed. It was dusk when I arrived and her house was in darkeness, but the front room curtains were opened and I guessed that as on other occasions when I'd calle din the afternoon, she'd gone to sleep by the fire. I was right and caught a glimpse of her through the sitting room curtains. I tapped the window and she awakened immediately, and then let me in. She's another Advent lover, and was delighted that I called. When I read to her the Gospel for the day (Mark 13:24-37) we both started smiling and ended up in laughter. It ends

Therefore, keep awake - for you do not know when the master of the house will come, in the evening, or at midnight, or at cockcrow, or at dawn, or else he may find you asleep when he comes suddenly.

We were around eighty, counting those who left early, for the Advent Carol service. Philip's hard labour in putting up advertising signs for the latter interestingly brought in a dozen more young adults than we usually expect at such an event, all faces I'd not see before, and maybe just people passing through. But it's part of our vocation and mission as a church in the heart of the city to be there and welcome all who want to share in our worship, for whatever reason, as often or a seldom as they wish to come. Community grows among those who see the value of this kind of openness and sharing as a way of witness to the Good News of the One who comes.

Capturing the moment

A nice email this morning from The Church in Wales Press officer, Anna Morrell, flagging up that the Western Mail had published a supporting letter I wrote the day after last week's press launch of the 'Enough is Enough' campaign.

In this time of great caution over investment I am concerned that the dysfunctional social environment created by the binge drinking culture will deter Big Money players from moving businesses to the city region. Maybe saying it loud and often enough is the only way to get policy makers to think a little harder about the quality of life and social values which need to be embodied in the kind of public life we foster. This is not advocating repression or a neurotic puritanism, but rather recognising just how unhealthy any excessively consumptive lifestyle really is - and how bad for the business economy that can be.

The City Centre Churches Together group met tonight, and it was time to report back on all the recent developments around us. I took the video camera with me and recorded the ensemble all singing 'We wish you a Merry Christmas' and shouting 'Nadolig Llawen' together. Filming was a lot easier than getting everyone to sing and speak together, so the end result was a bit of a shambles really, but very good humoured and in the spirit of the moment. Now I've really got to set my mind to editing and web publishing this material.

If the BBC can't stream our stuff the the Big Screen, we can put it up on the web and point the world towards it. Watch this space ....

Faith and the civic agenda

We had another Faith Focus Group meeting yesterday, early evening, which for the first time brought to the table two Muslim women from the 'Women Connect First' organisation, which does great adult education work with black and ethnic minority women in the city. There was a discernable sense of delight in the meeting. We have Christian, Sikh and Hindu members, and now Muslim members, and have doubled the female representation in this 80% male group.

It was mostly a meeting to report on progress and setbacks in our publicity profile raising efforts. The Council being supportive, and the BBC failing to deliver streamed user generated video content to the big screen outside St David's Hall, as promised months ago. We agreed that it was most important to keep on making a video of photographic archive of faith community material that can be drawn upon for publicity uses in the coming year. An act of faith in the opportunities that will emerge, I guess.

There's some uncertainty about the groups future, some consideration being given higher up of bringing this focus group to an end. Members seem keen to continue to meet anyway, having found the opportunity to share on matters of common interest about public life worth the effort to maintain. Paul Mannings, our convener is convinced that group has already inputted enough of value to justify retaining it as part of a slimmed down Countdown process, right through. Well we have picked up on a few issues - notably toilets, and access to places of worship, street carers, and the place of faith groups in the public self image of the city's cultural diversity. Some of it elusive to start with, but not everything is cut and dried in something a complex as the life of an urban centre.

It's marvellous to see people of different faith convictions beginning to share a common interest in civic issues. I was reminded of the World Council of Churches missionary theological reportage back in the 1970's asserting that "the world (It's God's world) determines the agenda for mission". It turns out to be true as a basis for interfaith encounter as well.

Cardiff's sense of place.

I attended an interesting workshop put on by Cardiff and Co in the Norwegian Church this afternoon, given by tourism consultant Angharad Wynne, on the subject 'A sense of Place'. She explored with us questions about what makes any place unique and special for those who visit it. Those working and living in the place may need a little exercising to focus in on how others coming in from outside experience a place in a way that makes it different from all others. Identifying this is important in any marketing strategy, and also significant in this globlised commercial culture where shops and shopping centres look the same and have much the same content in many part fo the planet.

Everyone needs a degree of familiarity in order to feel secure when they're away from home, but in order to make journeys to other places worthwhile and memorable, there has to be some sense of what is distinctive. That's the bit you tell your friends and gives them the incentive to follow in your footsteps.

This was an exercise in relation to St John's, which I did quickly and easily in my head, for we we have the evidence of visitor book comments about the beauty and peace of the building with its lovely stained glass and peacefulness in the heart of the city. We also have the evidence of people from far and wide queuing to consume home made soups, cakes and sandwiches, and welcomed by the friendly Tea Room volunteer teams, often being sent by friends, or bringing their friends to enjoy the place. We also get positive comments about the 'rogues gallery' of a century's images of former clerics, photos and art works over 200 years depicting the church from different angles. Absolutely unique. A great tourism asset, and missionary tool.

Trying to look at Cardiff objectively wasn't quite so easy. Many recent buildings looking much like others, shops like you'll find everywhere. But, the Bay Barrage has created a unique waterfront, and a new civic centre of landmark buildings, matching the Edwardian civic centre, and some of the city's Victorian buildings. The same is true of the new library, now gleaming bronze and blue in the winter sun. Memorable. SD2 is still under wraps. But when you've been around in the open topped bus and videoed them for posterity what other experience will linger?

How about, the singing during a match at the Millennium Stadium? How about a stroll through the arcades, the Castle, Bute Park? What about the municipally undervalued city market? Ashton's Fish stall? The City Arms. The Vulcan? Just a handful of places serve really indigenous food, and I'm not talking about 'chip alley', Caroline Street. All these were mentioned in discussion of the Cardiff sense of place. St John's too. But interestingly, Cardiff accent and lingo were mentioned, and also the spontaneous way in which people converse with strangers at bus stops, and are warm, friendly and helpful. Cardiff character - and it knows no ethnic divisions among the older generations. The younger tend to be more tribal. Hopefully they'll grow out of it.

Yes, the city's got a lot to distinguish it from others, as well as more of the ubiquitous sameness of modern trade. Getting the balance right is the big challenge.

What if 'Enough' was 'Too much' ?

I'm delighted to report that baby Jesus has been turned around in the outdoor nativity scene to face the Owain Glyndwr. The recumbent figure has wide open arms, to embrace the world, symbolically, in the old tradition of Christ child images. It's not exactly great art - at a cursory glance it looks as if the Babe of Bethlehem is stretched out sun bathing on top of a bird's nest. Maybe that will incite the curiosity of some. I'm also glad to report that the third king has shown up. No doubt I'll hear the story of the late arrival some time in the coming week.

Captain Eric Smith, bandmaster of the Grangetown Salvation Army Corps emailed me in response to my including him in an ecumenical round-robin announcing the 'Enough is Enough' campaign web-site sign up. "I couldn't sign up" he reported wryly; "There was no button to register a total abstainer." A healthy reminder that there are still plenty of people around, Christian as well as Muslim, for whom 'Enough' is 'Too Much'. It's not a fashionable position. It's a bit like conscientious objection to resolving conflict by violence. It asserts the principle that life can be lived pleasurably without this intoxicant. It's an implicit rejection of a type of consumerism, its massive industry and promotion of consumer lifestyle, on which the public coffers rely to balance the books, by taxation.

Just imagine what it would do to the economic crisis if suddenly the entire adult population renounced alcohol and stuck to their resolve. Imagine the juggling of accounts that Whitehall would have to engage in to cover lost revenue from customs and excise, increased expenditure on booze industry redundancies, decreased expenditure on public law & order, and A&E crisis management (although long term health issues would take generations to show savings because of damage to health working its way through the population already). Our lives for better and worse are so totally intertwined with alcohol in all its forms, that 'Enough' is as much as it is safe to advocate. Renunciation would, in its way, be admirably subversive of society if it ever caught on in a really big way.

Getting moderation on the social agenda

Today the Anglican Bishops and Chief Constables of Wales press launched a campaign to raise awareness about the dangers and cost to society of binge drinking. Wales is apparently the worst place in Europe for binge drinking. "Enough is Enough" is the slogan. The aim is to encourage people to drink moderately and responsibly, not to renounce booze altogether.

About seventy people gathered in the University Students' Union for the launch. We were addressed by Archbishop Barry, Barbara Wilding, Chief Constable of South Wales, Michael McCabe Chief A&E Consultant in Morriston Hospital, who spoke about the health dangers, and some measures to remedy the problem. Nick Newman of Cardiff's Licensed Victuallers Association bravely defended precautions taken by alcohol retailers, the President of the Students' Union spoke about responsible Union bar policy.

Wynford Ellis Owen, the new Chair of the Welsh Council on Alcohol and other Drugs too the platform last, with a moving and eloquent personal testimony, in which he spoke about his youthful alcohol abuse as a means to fill the spiritual vacuum in his life. He issued a quiet challenge to the church leaders present to work on filling the vacuum as well as trying to campaign on social issues. It was too quietly received for my comfort. I think he's right, but we've somehow lost the ability to address the widening gulf created by ideologues like Richard Dawkins and others, devaluing any common sense understanding of what authentic spirituality consists of.

The major common concern expressed was about supermarket cheap drink sales and the propensity people have for 'front-loading' themselves with alcohol before hitting town for a night out. We had a representative of Morrisons supermarket chain on our discussion table, who told us about their changes in alcohol retailing policy, designed to cut drastically this deadly kind of opportunism. The event launched the promotion of a website where people can register their commitment to moderate their drinking. It can viewed as a barometer of social concern, and people present were encouraged to sign up, and tell people in their networks to sign up so that the message of numbers expressing concern might speak for itself. It's www.alcoholpledge.co.uk if any readers in Wales want to sign up.

I had no misgivings about taking part in and giving practical support to this event, have lived with the clearing up after the mess of party nights and match days in the centre for the past six years. I was, however, disappointed that it wasn't made into as ecumenical and inter-faith event as possible. Anglicans may be (on a par with Catholics) the largest historic denomination in Wales, but the Evangelical Alliance umbrella covers equally as large a numerical combination of protestant, independent and pentecostal member communities, which are equally making their contribution on this matter.

It's also not a good idea that other faith communities weren't given opportunity to make visible the concerns some members express privately. It would have been a much more prolonged and difficult exercise to prepare - but lack of unanimity weakens the cause and risks division and disarray creeping in. We simply don't have the means to achieve this in the city, and on times I wonder if we ever will, without a major crisis creeping in to threaten us all.

Imaging the Holy Land

A couple of friends are soon to visit the Holy Land, talking about it with them gave me the urge to re-visit the photos I took in Jerusalem and the West Bank during my ten week sabbatical there at the end of 2000. This drove me further to dig out my photo digitising scanner, and start transferring them to my computer. It's a little while since I've done any work on extending my digital archive of old photos, and what struck me was that even the best and cleanest of well stored negatives didn't produce as fine a quality (as opposed to size of ) image as a newer digital camera. The scanner can only reproduce what's on the surface of the film. Maybe it's better with highest quality negative, but it just made me realise what a powerful tool has been placed into ordinary peoples' hands by modern digital photography. Content of pictures and camera skill is as it ever was a matter for an individual to work at. It's easy to take high quality looking rubbish photos.

Anyway, it was a good experience to go through the 105 pictures I took and to recall places I'd visited and people I'd met. 105 photos in ten weeks, as opposed to the 300+ I'll take inside a week when travelling these days. Three rolls of film and development costs, that was what I could afford on sabbatical in 2000, I had to select my shots sparingly. I have more vivid images of Jerusalem in my head than I do on film.

Some of them, it might not have been prudent to take - soldiers shoving and kicking Palestinian peasant women out of the way as they passed on patrol through crowded street sellers in the holy city. The shopkeeper in West Jerusalem with a pistol in his waistband. Men with locks in civvies with rifles over their shoulders, queuing for buses.... the defiant image of a palm print on a wall of the via Dolorosa, made in the blood of a youngster who had been slain nearby - it gave the Red Hand of Ulster a significance I'd not thought of before.

I'd love to return there now. Three years of profligate digital snapping the transformation of the city centre has strengthened my confidence in looking and capturing a moment, knowing that deleting failures, and cropping badly framed stuff can help shape a collection of images that tell a greater story. My West Bank landscape pictures are not up to much. The Old City pictures are much better, except that there aren't enough of them to represent the daily visual feast I remember having. It makes me wonder - did I lose a roll of film or something? I must check back on my paper journal. 2000 was pre-blogging days. I keep on thinking, I must have taken more than this. But the experience was just so vivid, it lives with me still. I had little trouble recalling and putting captions on all the photos I worked with.

I've posted them on Google's Picasa site

Tentatively encouraging signs

For the past three Sundays since we re-scheduled the main Sunday Eucharist to 10.00am, the numbers attending have gone up by 25%, casual visitors and regulars, and this despite the rather confusing access arrangements while the street outside the entrance is being re-paved. The later hour is making it easier for people to travel in, and that'll be pleasing if it's sustained. I hope this won't lead to a falling our with Council enforcement people because church people will be half an hour later leaving the pedestrian zone in future. Until there's a marked improvement in public transport infrastructure around the city centre, there's no prospect of everyone abandoning their cars to come to church by bus.

Work finished yesterday in front of the West Tower, so the entrance was only out of commission for five days in all. We have seven bike racks installed around the north perimeter railings. One day I counted two bikes using them, a further three still using the railings - cyclists too lazy to walk the extra fifteen yards to use the appointed facility, so long pleaded for. I wonder what we can do that will change habits and deter people? Until we can, there's hardly any point in painting the railing only to see them ruined within days by abrasion from chained up bikes.

It was great to speak with Greg Tricker on the phone tonight, and share with him our appreciation of his art exhibition. He's wonderfully self-effacing about his work, allowing himself to absorb many different inspirations and impulses and gestate them before finally setting out on a period of creative production which even he finds surprising and nourishing to his spirit. How I'd love to afford to mount an exhibition of his work in St John's. Apparently, the opening ceremony was attended by a couple of French people associated with Lourdes, and now there's a possibility of taking the collection over there for a visit. If it happens, it will be marvellous.

Marian perceptions

We got up horribly early and took the Megabus to London, to visit our old friend Greg Tricker's latest exhibition of paintings at Piano Nobile gallery in Notting Hill. This time he's created a couple of dozen works, mostly paintings but also woodcuts and sculptures reflecting on the life of Saint Bernadette of Lourdes. We had an invite to the opening night on Wednesday, but were unable to attend. Sister Wendy Beckett OSB presided over the occasion, an indication of how well thought of is Greg's work. He's also published an illustrated book of this collection - his fourth, and from our point of view a must-have, an early Christmas present to each other.

It's a remarkable collection, with only a handful depicting Bernadette's life as a nun, or with any obvious ecclesiastical reference. Mostly Greg portrays her with great simplicity at home with the family in her local sub-Pyrenean community, in ways that are suffused with a sense of spirituality. His work may resemble naive mediaeval illustrations, but spending time with any of his pictures reveals great understanding and depth of engagement with his subject.

His depictions of Bernadette's encounters with Mary are far from standard Catholic ecclesiastical art. They show an intelligent enquiring young girl looking up into Our Lady's tranquil face. Many of the paintings have a pale blue tint or component - a kind of Marian signature or influence. But his painting of the discovery of the Lourdes healing spring is washed in green light, suggesting an encounter with the green goddess, not out of irreverence, but from a deep awareness of the universality of the imagery of the eternal feminine with which he has worked.

I like Greg's artistic vision of Mary far better than any of the standard 19th century images of the Immaculate Conception which I have seen in churches up and down France over the years. One of his key works is painted not on canvas, but on a small wooden door, complete with hinges and bolt, vivid in its colour, iconic in convention. Bernadette wears a pale blue head covering resembling but not quite a halo, but her face is gold. An image of transfigured beauty. This was used on the invitation sent out from the gallery - a real masterpiece. He knows how to inspire a sense of wonder in the depths of simplicity.

We took my sister June with us to Piano Nobile, both the venue and the artist were a fresh discovery for her. It was great to be able to share the experience with her, and to know that she too is much taken with the art works of one of our contemporaries, whose images are an eloquent testimony to his perception of the sacred in the ordinary.

The day the reindeer came

Today, being Guru Nanak's birthday, I went to the Tudor Road Gurdwara to see if it might be possible to film the Sikh community celebrating together. Half a dozen men were busy in the kitchen preparing for the Langar following worship, too busy really for this to be an opportune moment for them to agree, so they advised me to write to them so that they could arrange a better occasion.

I returned to County Hall to pick up the editing software disk that came with the video camera, and then back to church to get ready to welcome Santa's reindeer into the churchyard for their evening meal before going on show in Working Street, as a key attraction linked to the St David's Centre Santa's Grotto opening. Once more the magic of animals from the wild did its trick, and a huge queue of parents with children formed to take a peek at them. Many brought our their camera phones and snapped them while they were grazing in the churchyard. This year a grazing reindeer from last year's event is set to appear on the parish Christmas card. We're still awaiting the return of the proofs from the printer, so we couldn't cash in on the moment.

Fortunately it was a little warmer an evening than last year, if a little damper. The numbers passing through the reindeer pen seemed as many if not more than last year, and everyone was cheery. People may be bothered about the impact of recession on Christmas spending, but I suspect that St David's PR people have done their operations a great favour by not cutting back on this event. Good will is something we all need in times of anxiety. Talking of which ...

Without me realising, yesterday a team of Council workers installed a nativity scene in the north church tower garden. The proposal was made last year, but couldn't be followed through in time. This year, it's happened. Mind you, we only have one cow and two wise men, and no shepherds!
Apparently there's a bit of a shortage of two foot high outdoor-capable figures. So I'll be hunting round ... maybe a garden gnome of the right size would be capable of a makover? Talking of which ....

Long ago one of the effigies of the six knight guardians standing on top of the riddel poles of the sanctuary screen in the St John's chapel got stolen. While discussing the crib figures missing in church, I chanced to look up and realised that a sixth figure had reappeared, resembling the others in shape and colour, but slightly smaller. Closer inspection revealed it to be - a Cyberman from BBC's Dr Who, dressed in knightly garb. Well, St John's did host the filming of the Dr Who Christmas special two and a half years ago, and there is a trade in models of the characters. The figure has been up there for nearly two months. Nobody noticed, until a puzzled tourist mentioned it in the church visitors' book. A nice bit of ephemeral whimsey, devised by Pauline.

I must ask her if she can devise a spare king and a few shepherds for the outdoor nativity.

Recording good-will

Today I borrowed a video camera from the Council's chief projects design and development officer Tony Riches, who's been very helpful and taken an interest in our attempts to communicate with the public something of the rich life of the City centre's faith communities. I'll be using it to record clips of faith communities in action over the next month, especially to film seasonal greetings from faith groups in their places of worship. The first challenge is learning how to use it and get results worth editing.

It didn't take me too long to get to grips with it because it is a Sony Handycam and Sony products all tend to work with quite similar conventions. I've used my digital camera to make short video clips before. This is the same thing, scaled up, improved quality and capacity to change focus and field of view.

Hmm - getting non shaky images without catching shoulder cramp when you can't find your tripod is a kind of zen challenge. So, I didn't get out of the house in time to see any of the evening's Christmas light switch-on ceremony, just down the road by the Law Courts. Instead I went straight to St Mary's to film the first memorial service held in Cardiff to remember homeless people who have died on the city's streets. It was a quiet thoughtfully prepared and moving event with about 45 people attending.

The church layout made it possible for me to film without being obtrusive, even if it did mean over reliance on the telephoto lens, with attendant shaky tendencies, to replace closeups. Seeing how deeply affected some of the young people present were by the opportunity the service offered them to remember friends and loved ones, made me wonder how sound-byte hungry media interviewers on occasions like this can approach people and ask how they are feeling and what it all means to them. The ritual itself says it all.

Now I have half an hour's film footage to edit, and none of the software tools I have for the purpose seem up to the task of HD video editing. Maybe I should have found out first how to switch to SD footage. Ah well, it's not a bad thing to have a new skill to master, as well as patience to acquire.

The impulse to trade

The Faith Focus Group last week encouraged me to go ahead with producing an inter-faith leaflet describing in an introductory way the various festive seasonal events celebrated by different faiths in the last couple of months of the year. I've been promised some funding support from the Saint David's Partnership to publish a good number of these, and the City Centre Management has helped out with a short initial print run, to permit me to get the leaflet out into the wild (well, into the Tourist information bureau, and the public libraries circulation network) before tomorrow's Christmas lights switch on.

There's a dearth of local interfaith information in Cardiff, so in addition to the faith trail website which I put together last month, I've now created another for this pupose, as yet un-named, but viewable here. I still have the task of recording some festive seasonal greetings from churches and other faith community members for broadcast on the BBC big screen outside St David's Hall. I sent off some video clips of last month's Diwali celebrations, plus some fine photographs for th e BBC team to use. However, I had a phone call to say that they couldn't at the moment get the feed channel to the big screen to work alongside the input from the main BBC news site. Will it happen at all? I have to presume it does and work to that end. Has the BBC promised more than it can deliver? We'll see.

I had an email of apology today from the outside broadcast team manager about Saturday morning's fiasco, despite my saying that no apology was required, only greater effort at consistency and better management when I wrote in to moan at them. The apology even promised to send me an interview fee which I neither expected nor asked for. Strange behaviour. If only they listened!

Only half a dozen people were present at the Retail Partnership Board meeting this morning. I guess everyone else is busy busting a gut with efforts to stave off the impact of the economic downturn. The meeting was full of gloomy impressions and scary rumours, which I refuse to propagate. I'd rather celebrate the defiant courage of those who just keep on keeping on, who refuse to cut and run now that thing are tough. I guess anyone at the interface between retailing and the public knows how things are unpredictable in times of boom and of bust. They are trained to be ready for anything. Success may come eventually simply from turning up for as long as you can. Paul Williams took us through the pre Christmas publicity campaign material, another superbly conceived job. 'Cardiff capital of shopping' is the strapline. Capital of optimism is how I see it. Why not dare the dark?

Just saying that made me think of the streets of Sarajevo, when I visited there twelve years ago now. Ruined buildings were either being repaired or their sites cleared, and where they had been cleared, people stood along the edge of the road, lined up selling whatever they had to passers by - mostly cigarettes, vegetables and a few small electrical goods as I recall, for whatever currency they could get. The impulse to trade is one of life's most vital signs.

We paused the meeting at eleven for the two minutes silence and Act of Remembrance. Ex-para Mark Knott, manager of Queen's Arcade, led us. It's one bit of the darkness that must never be disregarded.

Undiplomatic communicators

Yesterday afternoon, Philip rang from church to ask if I'd be willing to go down early to church today and be interviewed in the BBC Radio Wales booth, set up in St John Street, for the Match Day special programme. Wales are playing rugby against South Africa. A request from the producer had arrived at the office. It meant having to get up early to get may brain into gear and my body down to St John's by 9.15am, a bit of an effort on what's meant to be my 'day off' this week.

I arrived on time, but the BBC mobile studio looked abandoned, apart from having a security guard on duty. I asked if I was expected. Clearly not. He asked someone sitting at a console inside, who also looked non-plussed and said that the interview team had gone for their break. Just then a young lady turned up, and struggled to remember my name and looked not a little embarrassed.

"There's been a change of arrangements." she said.

"What does that mean?" said I.

She wouldn't come clean with me.

"Do you want me or not?" I asked.

She was vague.

"Are you very keen on rugby?" she asked.

"What's that got to do with it?" I said

I'm here because your producer rang up and asked for someone from the church to come and be interviewed yesterday and here I am, on my day off."

More discomfort.

"E-er, we tried to email you."

"What's wrong with my phone number?"

"We didn't have your home phone number."

"BBC Wales News has my home phone number and ring me if they are looking for a comment or an explanation about something."

"But that's a different department."

"So, what's the problem?"

"Our systems are incompatible."

"But you're the BBC. You have all that technology and your systems are incompatible!
My home phone number is in the public telephone directory."

With that I returned home exasperated, the start to my day off all messed up.

There was no email waiting when I logged on later. No message on the answering machine.
I recalled that previous outside broadcast producers rang me at home, also BBC engineers, occasionally needing access to an ISDN phone line terminal locked behind the church railings, used to provide a direct outside broadcast link to BBC Llandaff studios.

The fact is, these folk are great at finding you and communicating with you if they need you, and drop you when they don't. Changing demand of the moment is the general excuse. In reality much of live broadcasting is made up as it goes along, perhaps to the extent that insufficient attention goes into planning, or managing the team, so that courtesies of communication are forgotten or disregarded.

Now maybe they had second thoughts about using me, having heard the rumour that I'm not in love with the impact of stadium events on the cleanliness and well-being of our city centre. Maybe they were anxious that I might fail to talk idolatrously about our national sport, chill the atmosphere and cripple morale. Now that would be fair enough if they'd changed their minds. But just letting me turn up, to the embarrassment of their minions and annoyance of myself, is not what public service broadcasters should be doing with the Corporation's good name.

A few minutes on the radio now and then is one of those obligations that goes with my job, being an office holder in a public situation. I have no emotional investment in obliging. It's just the discourtesy of not making an effort to spare me a journey they invited me to make for their purposes which gives me concern about the values of the teams that do the broadcasting nowadays. Lord Reith must be spinning in his grave.

After lunch Clare and I finally got out of the house and went to the edge of Cardiff and climbed the Garth, just about the highest spot along the ridge for miles behind the city. It's a favourite walk, with its 4,000 year old burial mounds, close cropped springy turf and invigoratingly chill wind coming off the Severn Estuary. And all the while Wales were battling themselves to another glorious defeat against the Springboks - without my words 'on air'.