Emerging Mouse...

I did whatever any loving Dad would do - I lied.

Getting up from the sofa there was a blur of brown, a scurrying exit. A mouse! I shout up to Kate to tell her, then remember for Eryn this will be a new experience and one that no doubt will cause psychological tumult. So I gently mouth the word 'mouse' to Kate as she comes down the stairs and roll my eyes to indicate where.... "MOUSE!" it wasn't the kind of sensitivity that I was hoping for and it certainly had the effect on Eryn that I was trying to avoid.

"Well - I guess I could be wrong!" I try and build a case of stupidity to deflect the panic, I lied - "It must have been my imagination ... silly old Dad!".

"For all the talk I wonder if em. church is content to hide away out of sight. Safe behind slick html code, flash, soundbytes. Comfortable with its own pre-occupation with self
and its mouthwatering franchises and brands"

"Ha ha ha! Silly old Dad, fancy imagining that...?" The way Kate is joining in I think I have done pretty well to calm the house down.

"I tell you what though - I'll just see if I can find any traps at the shops"

I can hear them laughing at silly old dad as I leave. I tried to get the 'humane drive out to the country and release with emotion into the wild' traps but there weren't any (ok if there any mouse lovers reading this - this is where you probably need to stop reading!). On my return I find the table in the lounge being well used! The mouse had been sighted.

"Ha ha ha! Silly old Dad..."

Traps set all we have to do is wait for the mouse to emerge! We've waited and waited, it wont come out, in fact it seems to have disappeared the way it must have come in. Or perhaps it is just content to hide away out of sight.

Martin asked way before Christmas if I had thought much about the emerging church. When I started blogging much of my thinking was geared to getting my head around something that I feel a definite draw to. The creativity, ambiance, process is something that stimulates me in ways that have encouraged me, seen my faith deepen -yet feeling there is something missing for me. Since then I have listened into lots of talk on em. church - but that has been exactly what it has been ... talk. I'm waiting for signs of emergence, waiting to see the church emerge?

For all the talk I wonder if em. church is content to hide away out of sight. Safe behind slick html code, flash, soundbytes, video loops. Comfortable with its own pre-occupation with self and its mouthwatering franchises and brands.

My conclusion? I don't frankly care what em.church looks like as long as it has a love for the non-designer people who don't fit anywhere else. I don't care what em. church looks like as long as it doesn't succumb to being a fad - content to eventually disappear the way it came in. I don't care what em. church looks like as long as it doesn't forget to roll its sleeves up and get involved beyond that of 2 weeks in the summer in some poor deprived neighbourhood then running for the suburbs for the rest of the year.

Martin is looking at the impact of the emerging church debate on The Salvation Army, my thought is that the starting point should rather be what the impact of TSA could have on the emerging church. Whatever I am looking forward to seeing how Martin's conversations pan out.

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... Mouse update: mouse seems to have decided emerging not worthwhile! ...