Evasive Action

 “Poetry may make us a little more aware of the deeper unnamed feelings which form the substratum of our being, to which we rarely penetrate, for our lives are mostly a constant evasion of ourselves.” TS Eliot.

I heard this quoted by Gordon MacDonald a few months ago, reflecting on the fall of King David, and our habit of running away from our past rather than repairing it. It's one of those quotes which has latched on to me and won't let go, so I've a feeling it's not finished with me yet. I do find it easier to be active than reflective, and to fill time with distractions/stuff rather than letting myself settle.

One of the reasons I avoid myself is fear. I was quite nervous getting ready for a 7 day silent retreat back in May, partly it was fear of what God might do to me once He got me alone for 7 days without my Seven Dwarves (Twitter, internet, TV, Wii, Books, background music, comfort snacking) to provide junk consolation. It turned out much better than I expected. But I'm still falling back into the old evasive actions, and still haven't done what I promised I'd do after hearing Macdonalds words. For 6 months I've intended to go back through my life story, asking God to show me where the knots and wounds are, and to help me face up to them. And I'm still avoiding it.

Doctor Who Gets Religion: Or Does It?

The rebooted Doctor Who franchise has always drawn heavily on religious imagery and ideas, from a giant fiery devil figure in The Satan Pit to the climax of the David Tennant/Master showdown where the entire world prays for the Doctor (via the 'Archangel' satellite) and he's effectively resurrected and transfigured all in one go, and then bestows forgiveness on his mortal enemy.

The current series doesn't show any signs of letting off. The mid-series cliffhanger introduced the Headless Monks (bad) and the 'Clerics' - the church has become a military unit, though it's not quite clear who they answer to. 'Lets Kill Hitler' had several religious allusions too:
 - River Song poisons the Doctor with a kiss, the poison is revealed to come from the Judas Tree. No prizes for guessing where they got that one from.
 - The Silence is revealed to be a religious order, not merely a species.
 - River is cared for in a hospital run by nuns, the Sisters of the Infinite Schism. Great name. Think I know some of those.

With the religious thing thrown in about the Silence on top of the Headless Monks, the current impression is that this batch of Doctor Who writers lean towards the 'Religion is Bad and Dangerous' pole, which, to be fair, is probably the view of most people. The name given to the nuns suggests they are on the margins of religion - suggesting it's here that you find good, not at the centre.

Does Doctor Who get religion? It clearly gets the power of religion to command allegiance, but that's mostly portrayed in a negative way. Institutional religion is armed (the clerics) and dangerous. It'll be interesting to see where the whole Silence part of the story goes. Many of the good bits - e.g. elements of the life of Jesus, prayer, resurrection, life after death (e.g. Silence in the Library, which could have been written by N T Wright*) are all Doctored to retain their appeal but turn them into sci-fi.

I've written so much stuff on this blog that I can't remember if I've made this observation before, but it's remarkable to see the transformation in the sci-fi genre. From the thoroughly humanist Star Trek, sci-fi and fantasy have become the genre of choice for exploring spiritual issues. With the demise of the Biblical epic, and the blockbusting precedent of Star Wars, if soap operas are where our society holds up a mirror to its morality, sci fi and fantasy movies are where we hold up a mirror to our souls. Jesus figures abound, from Gandalf to Harry Potter to the Doctor himself, issues of destiny, prayer, life and death, character, the nature of evil, and the great rules/powers/persons that govern the universe, it's all there.

What's being said, well, that's debatable.........

*Silence in the Library has a 'resurrection to eternal life' based on using an advanced computer chip to store all the vital data about a person. After they die physically, this data is uploaded to a giant computer, where the dead enjoy a new virtual life, dressed in white (really? you don't say...) and reunited with their loved ones. This bears a striking similarity to an image used by Wright to describe how the resurrection works.

Shane Claiborne in Bristol, 3rd Sept

Short notice, but worth catching if you can. Worship to be led by the Rend Collective, who did this very clever Iphone thing:

The Yeovil Ninja. Yes, Really.

Update 31.8: he's been on Channel 4 too. Catch it via 4 on demand for the next couple of days.
Well, it's not quite Street Pastors, but the chap seems to have his heart in the right place. (Vid is on the BBC site, so I can't put it on here)

I shall be watching the undergrowth more closely from now on. And good to see he's patrolling Ninesprings: had my own run-in with a group of foul-mouthed teens there a few months ago, who were driving every family away from the park with their language and behaviour. Next time I'll call The Shadow.

Health and Safety Artwork

For your enjoyment. Particularly like what they've done to the Mona Lisa. For anyone under 40, Vision On was a kids TV programme, and yes, this is what it was like (though I'm not entirely sure about the sign language). From this lot.

Nintendo Wii: My Sims - Introducing your 3 year old to occult and voodoo

My Sims: it looked like a good game for our kids to play in the summer hols on the Wii. Create a character, build a town, watch a community develop, unlock various levels, etc. etc. So far so good.

Then we unlocked 'level 3', and some odd things started going on. In My Sims, the characters who move in to your town each have a main characteristic: there are 6 to choose from. Fun, Tasty (food), Cute, Studious and Geeky were fine, Spooky we just avoided. The trouble is that if you get Spooky characters living next door to each other, guess what? They hold a seance. And they invite you to join in.

That's right. This is a game which, according to the box, is suitable for 3 year olds upwards. And the characters in it are getting together around an ouija board to contact the dead - and succeeding. Following the seance, a ghost moves in. By the looks of it, you can do this in other My Sims spin-offs, like Kingdom or Agents.

But just in case your kids aren't having nightmares by this stage, or learning what fun it is to try to contact the dead, they can go prospecting in the 'desert' area. There, they'll find among other things voodoo dolls (scroll down to the 'scary' essences). Now these may have had a makeover since I last heard of them, but the basic idea of a voodoo doll is that through torturing the doll, the person it represents is themselves tortured in a way which mirrors what you've done to the doll. Again, a lovely idea for a 3 year old to take on board.

Once I've got over the outrage, shock and sheer disbelief at this idiocy, I'll be writing to Nintendo, though I'm sure (I hope!!) that I won't be the first. It's pretty sick to have a major global brand aiming games at toddlers which normalise playing with the occult, and activities which can lead to all sorts of spiritual messes. Woe to those who cause one of these little ones to stumble.

Health and Safety: a Refresher

The Health and Safety Executive is clearly afraid of getting closed down in the next quango cull, putting out the story yesterday that many daft health and safety decisions (like this one) weren't justified. A review of H&S legislation is due in October, and I guess the Executive knows that its role, or even existence, might be reviewed too.

Here's what they said: complying with health and safety regulations was often used as a "convenient excuse" for organisations to justify unnecessary decisions.

Now where have we seen that before? Oh yes, secular councils airbrushing all Christian references from their local community on the pretext that it might offend someone of another faith, even though nobody of another faith had ever complained.

In the meantime, it's a great excuse to repost this video, which tells you all you need to know.



apologies to any Health and Safety professionals out there. More stuff like it here.

How to Stay No.1 Cricket Team: my top 5.

It's been fantastic to watch England steamrollering every team before them over the last 12 months. Bedtime stories with the kids have been replaced by an hour in front of the cricket highlights, and even as I write they are leafing through my old copies of Wisden looking up cricketing records. Result.

So a big well done to this England side, who have already more than surpassed the 2005 Ashes heroes by taking victory over Australia in their stride, and then doing even better in the months following.

Strauss is already talking about the winter tests against Sri Lanka and Pakistan; this England succeed consistently because they can give a series their all, whilst keeping their eye on the longer term.

Thankfully for everyone, I'm not an England selector, but here's a few thoughts on what we need to stay on top of:

1. Find a good opening batsman. Strauss totally deserves the 4 months break he's now going to get before the winter. He has presided over a dramatic rise in Englands fortunes, and deserves every minute of celebration, and of rest. But Strauss has started shelling catches at an alarming rate, and age is not on his side - he'll be 35 by the start of next summer. He'll retire a hero in the next couple of years, and Cook will need a new partner.

Longer term, Bell, Trott and Pietersen are 29, 30 and 31 respectively, and all at the top of their game. Fast forward 3-4 years and they will be an ageing unit, and England will need to find a way to blood quality middle-order players. Some will slot in straight away - Trott has been a phenomenal example -  but if others, like Bell (e.g Bopara?), need a few years to really hit their stride, it could be difficult.

2. Beat South Africa. India came to England off the back of a tour to the West Indies, with several players not match fit, and didn't have enough games to prepare themselves. Having said all that, to roll over the Indian batting line-up 7 times out of 8 for less than 300 was phenomenal. South Africa remain as the only proper contender for the top spot in Test cricket. Smith, Kallis, Amla and DeVilliers are all quality batsmen, Steyn and Morkel are top-ranked bowlers. The tragedy is that, thanks to ICC scheduling, the SA tour of England in 2012 has only 3 tests. With 5 ODI's and 3 2020s, there is scope for some meaningless 1 day cricket to be scrapped and replaced by what people really want to see, a 5 test series between two well-matched teams. I hope negotiations have already started.

3. Bowlers who can bat. India collapsed in spectacular fashion to lose the final test - you can't imagine this England batting line-up doing that. Who would you rather see coming out to bat at 300-6, RP Singh or Tim Bresnan? The current England numbers 8-11 average a combined total of 109.87 between them. The second choice 8-11 (Tremlett, Finn, Onions, Panesar) average around 40 combined. Injuries to bowlers are as regular as Boycott's opinions, so the likes of Woakes, Patel, Rashid, etc. are vital. England have replaced a bowling all-rounder (Flintoff) with a bowling unit who can all bat. Having raised the bar on the fielding skills of bowlers (step forward Jimmy Anderson), can England maintain the batting strength too?

4. Injury: the perpetual problem. All of the current England bowling attack have been out of the game injured in the last 12 months. The sheer quantity and remorselessness of the international calender guarantees that there will be more injuries, or people who cannot take the grinding mental strain of performing at peak level every month of the year. There will be more Trescothicks and Yardys. England's selectors need the equivalent of a replacement 11 on standby, and more due care and attention to scheduling and workload. I still don't think we've paid attention to the alarm bells. International cricket is consistently losing talent to injury (wouldn't the winter Ashes have been more of a contest with Shaun Tait in the mix?), and Englands team will do the same unless things change.

5. Keeping 2020 in perspective. There's no doubt that England have benefited this summer from the IPL, in both series. Malingas withdrawal from Test cricket to follow the money, and the jaded Indians are both traceable to the dollars now available for whiz-bang cricket. Nobody remembers who was the best one day team in the 1980s, but they do remember the West Indian test team. Nobody will remember who was the best 2020 team in 2011-15, but they will remember if England consistently dominate Test cricket. Yes it's good to have a successful one day side, but to really succeed England need to keep this in perspective. We will be kicking ourselves if Broad breaks down in a meaningless 2020 series and isn't available against South Africa next year.

And Finally
6. Stay out of Boycotts way. 3 England batsmen are closing in on Boycotts record of the most Test centuries scored by an England batsman. Pietersen, Cook and Strauss all stand on 19, Boycott is on 22, and Bell is closing fast on 16. By this time next year, Boycott will no longer be top of the charts. I'm sure he'll have something to say about that, and if not, Aggers will. Repeatedly.