The Revd Richard Haggis joins the blogosphere

This illustration, chosen because of its dreadful pun on the word ‘Reflections’, is in honour of my friend, the Revd Richard Haggis. Many of you read and enjoyed his guest post on this blog on ‘The Sound of Silence’.  I am very happy indeed to be able to report that his many friends and admirers have finally persuaded him to start his own blog. I think he realised in the end it would be best to give in to force majeure, but he gave a very creditable performance of being dragged to the Speakers’ Chair  with a becomingly modest humility – rather more convincing than that of Speaker Bercow on YouTube.

He also writes like an angel. Original and arresting phrases tumble out of him, one after the other, and it is a real pleasure to read him just for his style and expression. He has had a difficult time in the Church of England, which he tells us a little about on the blog, but the pain has tempered his iron into steel, if I may put it like that. He goes right to the heart of the question, but removes all  histrionics before writing about it. To a fellow Anglo-Saxon, this gives his words all the greater impact.

But if you don’t get the point of puns, prepare to groan now. Although I expect he will mostly reserve them for Facebook, the fecundity of his brain and his delight in language mean that he cannot resist a good pun. Sometimes he cannot resist a bad pun either. The title of his new blog? ‘Winsome, Lose Some’. Whether this counts as a good or a bad pun, you will have to decide. There is plenty of room in the comments section, and I urge you to visit and welcome Richard to the blogosphere. For the competitive ones amongst us, we had better look to our laurels!

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Becoming a Digidisciple

I normally post a couple of times a week, which is a routine I seem to have settled into. But my time clock is slightly out this week as the last piece that I wrote was not for this blog, but for Big Bible. I have become a ‘digidisciple’. Here is what the website says about this venture:

What is a digidisciple?

Whether as a Christian or a digital explorer, you’re a newbie or an old hat, a rookie or a bishop (and in the digital sphere, there will be some who fit in all categories), we all have something to contribute to the digital space. The concept of the digital as ‘space’ or a ‘culture’ is important as we come from a perspective in which:

• As Christians we live 24/7 for God, in whatever spaces we live in or engage with.
• There is no such thing as ‘virtual’ and ‘real’ worlds: only online and offline space/cultures – the connection between the two is different for each individual.
• We need to take seriously our Christian presence both online and offline.  Are we the same person, living by the same values in both ‘spaces’?…

A ‘digital disciple’, or, as we are calling it, a #digidisciple is someone who seeks to live out their Biblically-informed Christian faith in the digital space, whether they are dipping a toe in, or are fully immersed in the digital worlds.

The copyright arrangements are generous, and we are allowed to copy the pieces to our own blogs a week after they have been published on the BigBible site. Digidisciples make whatever commitment they can sustain: I have said I will submit something every other month.

Perhaps we can persuade you to join us?

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Moving House

We’ve made it! I do feel it’s been quite a journey (and Word Press is not as intuitive to use as Blogger was) but, to those of you who told me that it was necessary to move the blog into the main Lay Anglicana website, yes, I can now see you were right.

The effect on the number of page views has been gratifyingly significant. Now, how to put the next bit? It’s another Calcutta story – only slightly of the shaggy dog variety. I was on the committee of the Women’s Friendly Society, whose address was 29 Park Lane, Calcutta. In my role as lady in waiting to the President, Roma Bhagat, I accompanied her on a trip to buy fabric. We chose something which I was sure would be a perfect match and, on our return, found that it did indeed go perfectly. It is notoriously difficult to carry colour in one’s head, and thinking that Roma was rather slow to praise my artistic genius, I said: ‘Do I have an eye, or do I have an eye?’  To this day, twenty-two years later, I can hear her reply, and see her expression: ‘Well, you have a trumpet!’ Ouch. And it’s not as if I haven’t had a recent warning from Pam – though admittedly not personal- to avoid the snare of pride and vainglory.

Right. Now to blow my own trumpet then. The Wikio ratings for August are just out. Whereas last month, the blogspot blog was at #71, this month the rating for the blog in its new home is #39!

What I ought to say instead, of course, is thank-you all very much for visiting. As you know, I couldn’t have done it without you!

Notes

The first photograph, ‘Reflections’ is by Ian Mason via 12 Baskets.

The second is from Shuttercock.