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In September Bridge Builders held its first national conference on the subject of church mediation. Nearly 50 people gathered at St Katharine’s in the East End of London for a stimulating day. In the opening presentation, Alastair McKay, director of Bridge Builders, offered three challenges: first about changing the culture of how our churches think about and engage with conflict; second, about promoting and resourcing mediation as one way of dealing with conflict; and third, about recognising the limits of mediation, and taking a more systemic view of the conflicts that arise.

So how does the culture of the church need to be changed? How can we avoid conflict being experienced only as a destructive force in church life? Here are a just a few suggestions for that long-term work...

by Jonathan Bartley

As the direct, historic Christendom alliance of church and governance has weakened dramatically in recent years, so the relationship between church and state in a country like Britain has changed. It has moved toward accommodation to a set of mutually reinforcing interests which reflect crises in both faith communities and in the national political order.

The basic concerns of political leaders (to legitimate their rule, create a stable order and find ways of delivering their policy goals) have remained consistent, of course. But their realisation has waned in the face of seemingly uncontrollable economic and social forces. In this context a certain ‘multi-faith establishment’ has emerged. Partnerships between faith groups and government at local, regional and national level have developed. The features of this 'new deal' include strategic partnerships – promoted by government guidance, seek to involve religious groups in service provision and civic functions.
But this 'new deal' between churches, in particular, and government may in fact go much further and wider. It is best examined by first looking at some of the respective difficulties church and state face...

by Dora-Marie Goulet

Having been to other events in this vein over the last year, I went in with certain expectations. My adrenaline was pumping, and my poor body desperately wanted to fight or to flee, but I made myself sit quietly and listen intently to the one hour presentation by Baroness Cox on “Bridges not Walls: Reconciliation thru Realism.”

Perhaps because I had already had exposure to this view of interfaith dialogue, this time I was able to move past astonishment to analysis of the approach. I was fascinated to realize that it has much in common with the radicalized Islam it warns us of.

In Ed Husain’s book, The Islamist, he describes how young Islamists are taught to tie local events to global conflicts to raise the fervour of people who might otherwise be apathetic. Cox’ presentation, as I understood it, was to be about Christian/Muslim dialogue, instead over three quarters of the presentation looked at situations of conflict in Nigeria, the Sudan and Indonesia...

Christianity, Democracy, and the Radical Ordinary: Conversations Between a Radical Democrat and a Christian

By Stanley Hauerwas, Romand Coles

In Christianity, Democracy, and the Radical Ordinary, theologian Stanley Hauerwas and political theorist Romand Coles reflect about possibilities and practices of radical democracy and radical ecclesia that take form in the textures of relational care for the radical ordinary. They seek to shift political and theological imaginations beyond the limits of contemporary political formations (such as global capitalism, the mega-state, and empire), which they argue are based upon both the denial and production of death.

Hauerwas and Coles call us to a revolutionary politics of "wild patience" that seeks transformation through attentive practices of listening, relationship-building, and a careful tending to places, common goods, and diverse possibilities for flourishing. Both authors translate back and forth across—as well as dwell in the tensions between—the languages of radical democracy and of trial, cross, and resurrection. Engaging each other through a variety of genres—from essays, to letters, to cowriting and dialogue—Hauerwas and Coles seek to enact a politics that is evangelical in its radical receptivity across strange differences and that cultivates power in relation to vulnerability....

by Asha Rogers, Sheffield Univeristy Speak Group

I recently heard the American author, poet and worship leader David Ruis speaking about the nature of ‘true worship’. He challenged the audience to “walk into the simplicity of engaging with what we have, and the need that we see.”
In many ways, this is a good summary of what lies at the heart of our decision to try and host the Big Dress Tour in Sheffield, from 8th to 12th May 2008.

It’s not because our SPEAK group is completely organised, brimming with capability, resources and bright ideas (although they’re coming!), but precisely because there is a need to continue making a big noise about corporate accountability, and as students we have a uniquely unusual amount of time and an unhealthy amount of energy (albeit little money!) which we can bring together in pressing for social change.

For most of us in Sheffield, SPEAK represents an intersection of justice, prayer and creativity all within a community context, and we hope that through hosting the Big Dress we can reflect something of these qualities (which have had a real impact on us) onto the student and local community...

by Lesley Misrahi

Simplicity is one of the virtues which are particularly important to Anabaptists. We know some groups demonstrate this by avoiding technology and modern dress. Yet we can be accused of hypocrisy because clearly we use cars and live in cities and watch TV. So how can we say that we have a simple lifestyle, and do we even want one?

Simplicity is not a simple subject and the term seems to represent a variety of lifestyles, some of them contradictory. Why is one person’s simplicity so different from another’s? And what do we do when living ‘simply’ involves a great deal more work? It’s not easy to say what simple living is, but we all know what it’s not.

It ‘s not the celebrity lifestyle that has spilled out of the pages of Hello magazine and seems now to be a major plank of popular culture - in which people are measured only by their wealth, looks, money and who they’re sleeping with at the moment...