Monday, March 28, 2005 AD
Lutheran Angling
In my blogroll update I mentioned "one other Lutheran addition on which I will go into more detail later". This is the Lutheran Angles blog (britishlutherans.blogspot.com), which is intended to be a group blog for members of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of England, where we can discuss how the ELCE should maintain and develop its ministry as it moves into its second fifty years of existence.
I'm in the process of sorting out invitations for various potential participants, and non-ELCE members are very welcome to leave comments. Indeed, we positively encourage this, as the insights and opinions of Lutherans outside the UK will be very valuable to us.
I've put two posts up so far. The first, "What does this (blog) mean?" summarises the intended purpose of the blog. I've also taken the opportunity to explain what I think are the benefits of a blog format as opposed to a discussion board or email list, and in particular the parallels between blogging and open-source software, both of which operate on a "bazaar" rather than a "cathedral" model of development.
At its best, blogging enables people to get their thoughts out into the public domain rapidly (rather than having to spend ages writing perfectly-crafted essays) and then to benefit from feedback from a wide range of other people, many of whom have knowledge or experience that directly relates to the issue under discussion. The hope is that this can allow for constructive and enriching discussion that proves beneficial as the ELCE considers its future direction. And, as I say at the end of that post, "even if we cannot achieve anything quite so ambitious, at the very least we will, hopefully, have some good and useful discussions, and help strengthen the bonds of friendship between our various churches within the ELCE.
See also CS Lewis's comment about fellow-pupils often being more helpful to one another than their schoolmaster, on which I blogged a few months ago.
The second post, "What is the ELCE for?" then sets out my own personal view of what the strategic priorities for the ELCE should be, namely:
I'm in the process of sorting out invitations for various potential participants, and non-ELCE members are very welcome to leave comments. Indeed, we positively encourage this, as the insights and opinions of Lutherans outside the UK will be very valuable to us.
I've put two posts up so far. The first, "What does this (blog) mean?" summarises the intended purpose of the blog. I've also taken the opportunity to explain what I think are the benefits of a blog format as opposed to a discussion board or email list, and in particular the parallels between blogging and open-source software, both of which operate on a "bazaar" rather than a "cathedral" model of development.
At its best, blogging enables people to get their thoughts out into the public domain rapidly (rather than having to spend ages writing perfectly-crafted essays) and then to benefit from feedback from a wide range of other people, many of whom have knowledge or experience that directly relates to the issue under discussion. The hope is that this can allow for constructive and enriching discussion that proves beneficial as the ELCE considers its future direction. And, as I say at the end of that post, "even if we cannot achieve anything quite so ambitious, at the very least we will, hopefully, have some good and useful discussions, and help strengthen the bonds of friendship between our various churches within the ELCE.
See also CS Lewis's comment about fellow-pupils often being more helpful to one another than their schoolmaster, on which I blogged a few months ago.
The second post, "What is the ELCE for?" then sets out my own personal view of what the strategic priorities for the ELCE should be, namely:
- Spreading the Gospel in our communities.
- Serving the "Lutheran diaspora" within the UK.
- Promoting Lutheran teachings within the wider UK church.
- Celebrating (in both senses of the word) the Divine Service, and showing that the historic worship of the church need not be incompatible with living, breathing, attractive Christianity.
