I’m back (again)!

It appears April was a false dawn for getting back on the blog bandwagon. I fell back off and have struggled to get back into the habit. But I will try again and post at least each week.

I was inspired by spending some time with my friend Alan Wilson, currently my successor as Bishop of Buckingham. We were at the Leadership Summit in Chicago last week and he has started blogging this month. His blog’s great and bound to be for the long haul – he’s technically able and a fine photographer, as well as having lots to say.  Do check out his reflections on the Leadership Summit on his blog.

It was a great week.  Highlights for me were, firstly, the experience of being away with sixteen people from our Diocese and seeing the way they related to one another and were open to the learning output of the Summit.  Secondly, I was impressed by all the sessions, apart from one, and came back re-envisioned for the potential of the Church to make a difference in the world. 

There’s a lot of other stuff I could say, but I’ll save that for another time. My final reflection relates to one of Willow Creek’s core values – “Excellence honours God and inspires people.”  To be as good as you can be is a great challenge and not just for leaders.

During my time with the Willow Creek Association, I learnt this.  That if you can get funding to see this thing in the USA it’s worth it.  A very close second is to visit the Global Leadership Summits that are held in September and October around the UK.  These are by videocast and pound for pound you won’t get a better leadership learning experience anywhere in the world.  The feedback from last year’s videocast conferences was exceptional.  Here’s my advice – BE THERE!

 

My blogosphere

I’m not going to pretend that the world of blogging is one I’ve been exploring for a long time. Although I did think of starting to blog about a year ago, it was by accident (literally) that I set up a blog and I have only been blogging “properly” for the last month.

Technorati has this great quotation by one Matt: “55 million blogs… some of them have to be good.” I have only begun to explore the blogosphere but here are a few blogs from the Christian scene that I have spent some time at.

In the Christian scene, there’s a huge amount out there coming out of the emerging church. Blogs that have interested me here go from the local, with my friend and colleague, Paul Roberts, blogging on this subject amongst others, to the global, with Alan Hirsch in Australia saying some interesting things. One of the most popular hubs for the alternative worship community is Jonny Baker’s blog.

There also seem to be a lot of chaplains blogging out there. I’ve enjoyed checking out Maggi Dawn’s stuff (not just because she has linked to me).

Dave Walker at Cartoon Church commented in response to me starting to blog that the C of E as an institution has been fairly “anti-blogging”. I have no idea about that. It’s more likely that a lot of us in the C of E are clueless about new technology and how to use it. I for one am still a beginner. What I do know is that it’s a great way of sharing and cross-pollenating ideas.