johnnylaird

Swedish Salvation Army Officer, Patrick Olterman has produced a series of blog posts that represent possibly the most comprehensive personal view of The Salvation Army and homosexuality that’s available anywhere at the moment.

It’s a big read –expansive (12 individual blogposts…and counting), in-depth, personal yet highly relevant for the movement in general and possibly with some important resonances for other Churches exploring their relationship with and response to the LGBT community.

The posts have appeared for the first time an English translation, I believe, in two places almost simultaneously.

You can read them at Patrik’s own blog, “Warcry – An Epic Love Story Played Out on a Battlefield”, or alternatively at a niche site for Former Salvation Army Officers that is run by Sven Ljungholm, who is responsible for the translation from the original Swedish into English. By all accounts, people are saying that Sven has done a great job in translating Patrik’s series of posts.

The reason I mention both is that I’ve found it useful to refer to both versions. Patrik’s blog has a clearer, cleaner aesthetic that’s easier on the eye and scans well as you navigate through it.

However, at the time of me writing this post very few people have left any comments at Warcry.

Almost all of the dialog and comment from others is on the FSAO site, where the comments are being used quite robustly, so it’s been good to dip into the posts there too – although if you’re unfamiliar with the site, or indeed The Salvation Army it can be bit of a trawl to find your way around.

Taken as a whole, Patrik’s writing is definitely worth taking some time to read, but if you can’t give it the time, you might want to check out a shorter post on the subject here…

• Follow Patrik on Twitter
• Patrik’s Warcry blog
• A post of my own re The Salvation Army and our response to the LGBT Community

HT to Patrik for the pic

Online buddy, Martin Thompson, who blogs at Missiome and was one of my early points of reference when starting on my own blogging journey is going through a rich vein of form at the moment with a quick succession of really good honest and exploratory posts about faith.

Martin’s thoughts have a lot of resonance for me, so I thought I’d share the posts in order just to give others who may not be familiar with Missiome to discover what he has to say.

• beliefs 1 – God
• beliefs 2 – God continued…
• beliefs 3 – Jesus
• beliefs 4 – the spirit…
• beliefs 5 – belief
• beliefs 6 – church
• beliefs 7 – the bible

HT to Martin for the image, and for articulating stuff that I’ve thought about, but never really put down in any readable fashion and adding so much more to the process

More on Missiome at johnnlaird.net

With the Tech City Map and Silicon Roundabout grabbing all the headlines, it’s about time I gave an update to what’s happen with all things digital in my home town of Oxted, as a follow up to last year’s Oxted Digerati post.

More and more local people in Oxted are becoming active in entrepreneurial initiatives and digital story sharing.

From the classic “do one thing and do it well” school comes Giraffe in a Scarf, to continent-crossing tech firms like Natterbox, and local bloggers Diana Stavely and Allister Frost the Oxted Digerati are more active than ever.

Near neighbours in Limpsfield Village Shopping have grasped the nettle in using Social Media to promote their small but perfectly formed high st, and established favourites like Footprint going from strength to strength, while Big Yellow Bag is gearing up nicely.

So, what’s happening where you are?  What are you doing to contribute to your local digital community, and how serious are you being about taking the online…offline?

Feel free to let me know if you’re part of the Oxted Digerati, and I’ll give you a shout out too!

More on Oxted on johnnylaird.net

HT to PhillyClarke for the vid

My good buddies at Kore UK are upping the ante with their new consultancy site – aheadintheclouds

Matt & Juls are two of the most talented people I know, and I’m constantly in awe of their creative and cognitive gifts.

If you need what they offer, you should get in touch with them.

They rock!

Also, you might want to check out their other brilliant sites; the also brand new and cool as… unrelated sources, Worth the Ask and viewfromtheoffice

• HT to Aheadintheclouds for the image
• More on Kore at johnnylaird.net

I love a beautifully designed tee shirt
I love to see an entrepreneurial idea grow & flourish
I love to see a business use Social Media intelligently
I love to see an elegant website presence
I love to see someone who understands the power of narrative

….so….

Ugmonk ticks all the boxes, and Ugmonk impresses me

HT to Ugmonk for the image
HT to Big Cartel to sending me their way
HT to Huw for sending me to Big Cartel

A couple of years back, when the BNP won a couple of seats in the Euro elections, in my efforts to try and understand how best to respond with appropriate grace to such an unacceptable situation I stumbled across a blog post from Tom Attah.

Tom’s post – Curry and a bit of Motown – beautifully articulated a lot of thoughts that the whole scenario stirred in me.

Tom Attah from The Blind Club on Vimeo.

Not only is Tom a great writer, but he’s a brilliantly authentic Bluesman, whose career has ramped up since he penned this article.

• Tom’s site
• Tom on Twitter
• Tom inspired post inspired on johnnylaird.net

Now, I know it’s a commercial…I KNOW I’m being sold to…but I’m a sucker for a well made ad, and especially one that imagines the future.

So, I have to tell you I love the new activate the future site from BMW, with its series of short films musing on the future of the transportation and its broader impact on society and culture.

With contributions from all kinds of future looking luminaries like WIRED’s Chris Anderson, Treehugger’s Graham Hill and one man media empire and all round good egg Chris Brogan the activate the future is so content rich that you can keep going back and back.

Highly recommended.

Other ads that have grabbed me:

• Bring it to life
• Made from girders
• Welcome back
• Scotland Forever

One of my many tribes are the Something Beautiful Podcast crew, who have been doing a great job these last couple of years of providing a vehicle for some of the most interesting Jesus following voices at the fuzzy edges of Church.

Having been a massive @sbpodcast fan, I’m delighted now to be an occasional co-presenter together with JD, Thomas, Stewart and Travis – good guys one and all!

So, it’s been cool to recently share – together with Thomas – some of the Something Beautiful Podcast with Bex Lewis at the Big Bible site.

Check out the interview here

The latest episode of the Podcast features my good friend and fellow Kore UK Trustee, Will Taylor AKA Big Daddy Whale, chatting on with Thomas Mathie. As usual, it’s a good listen.

OK

December 1

Advent

Please check out The Natwivity…follow Mary, Joseph, the shepherds, wisemen & others on Facebook & Twitter as the Christmas story unfolds. Get involved!

TELL YOUR FRIENDS AND FOLLOWERS ABOUT THE NATWIVITY.

Last month’s Christian New Media Conference was fabulous for all kinds of reasons, not least because it gave me an opportunity to discover the amazing Mr Ian Aspin – all round good guy, the man who gave the world Really Good Thinking, “Giveacrapanomics “and one of the most refreshing and voices out there on the whole “digital-tools-changing-our-world-for-the-good”

I come across a lot of naysayers who are willing to try to minimise and trivialise the impact of Facebook, Twitter et al on broader culture.

Ian is an antidote to all of that, with a no nonsense positive attitude that’s resolute and affirming; so good to hear, particularly here in the UK where cynicism is practised as a high art.

In Ian’s own words..”Think Better. Feel Better. Take an Aspin”

HT to Ian for the pic