Colourful Dreamer

I went to see "An Inconvenient Truth" on Sunday with my family. Global Warming has been on my mind since I went to England in August and discovered how dire it all is, and that it is not far off, but happening now. What a great movie. It made me angry that The Republicans cheated their way to power at the cost of so many lives, and maybe our planet. The USA produces 1/4 of the CO2 and other greenhouse gases, and is doing very little to change that Federally. Yet those same cheating Republicans also gave Al an opportunity to work globally to change what we are doing, and maybe stop the madness. Maybe. As I drove (I confess) to work, I heard Jim Mora and a guy from Dunedin joking about how global warming really wasn't their number one issue. I know my house will be under water if even half the dire predictions come true. I wondered how much of Dunedin would go under? And scarily, the ice caps are melting now!! This is not a theory that might happen way in the future. It is ...

Life has been way too busy, and will be for a while yet. I had the Third Order Franciscan convocation two weeks ago now. My first chapter, and on show doing stuff all weekend. a big theme was the need for us as Franciscans to grow up, and take our responsibility for living the Franciscan way here in this country more seriously, i.e. not leaving it up to the first order brothers. Last weekend I attended the religious life advisory committee. Most of the time I wondered what the meeting was about and why I was there, although it was nice to meet other religious, and some others with an interest. Anyway, one of the discussions was around leadership models. I realized how I haven’t really thought about what kind of minister provincial I am called to be in the order, or what kind I want to be? In a way, I slipped into the guru up front role. Brother Kentigern SSF talked about how with four professed brothers it is silly to have a guardian, and that they could easily just work together. Tha...