St Martin-in-the-Fields at Greenbelt

As part of our content partnership with Greenbelt, St Martin-in-the-Fields contributed music, a new discipleship resource, and HeartEdge reflections on commerce.

Singers from St Martin-in-the-Fields with our Director of Music Andrew Earis, explored through word and song some of the great music of our religious heritage. Great Sacred Music provided an exploration in words and music of some of the UK’s top 100 hymns, including Be Thou My Vision, Abide With Me and Dear Lord and Father of Mankind. Sacred Space was a time of silence, reflection, music and prayer to draw close to God and experience stillness and peace, including music from the Taize Community.

Alastair McKay with Ayla Lepine launched ‘Inspired to Follow: Art and the Bible Story’ by facilitating three taster sessions from this new online interactive discipleship resource. ‘Inspired to Follow: Art and the Bible Story’ is a free resource to explore the Christian faith, using paintings and Biblical story produced by St Martin-in-the-Fields in partnership with the National Gallery.

The course uses fine art paintings in the National Gallery’s collection, along with a Biblical text and a short theological reflection, as a spring board for exploring these two questions:

• How can I deepen my faith in God?
• What does it mean to follow Jesus today?

The course is designed for use in a group, and is intended to build relationships among those participating. It has been structured as 22 hour-long gatherings over three terms, and aims to cover key elements of the Biblical story from Creation to Apocalypse. Each hour-long session can, however, stand alone. So participants don’t need to have attended an earlier session to participate.

The following materials are offered:

• An overview of the course
• Guidelines for the course facilitator(s)
• 22 theological reflections, typically about 8 minutes in length
• 22 handouts with a Biblical text and two reflection questions
• 22 images of paintings from the National Gallery collection
• A list of further recommended resources

To access this free resource, go online and register your details here: www.inspiredtofollow.com .

I contributed to a session entitled 'Cathedrals and commerce: The challenge facing large churches'. This was in The Exchange, a new venue for 2017 that provided the opportunity over the weekend to think together about enterprise for the common good. I was part of a panel chaired by Cliff Mills which explored the reality that large churches are getting involved in enterprise activity to stay open and asked how we can find the right way through commerce and cathedrals. I talked about these questions in relation to HeartEdge, together with The Very Revd John Witcombe, Dean of Coventry Cathedral, Alison Inglis-Jones from the Trussell Trust, and Jonny Gordon-Farleigh from Stir to Action.

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Dear Lord and Father of Mankind.