SOUL SURMISE

TOMORROW (EASTER SUNDAY) in FITZROY - 21.4.19

Easter Sunday (11am) and Fitzroy,  like the historical Church, will be looking for women to declare the risen Jesus!

Oh it is so easy looking back at Resurrection Sunday.  It is much more difficult to be Mary, Peter or Thomas. They have walked through the previous week, the darkness getting darker as it has gone. Friday was as awful as it could get and for an entire day Jesus is dead. In a tomb. In that upper room The disciples weren't singing, "It's Friday but Sunday's coming."

So, let us look at what resurrection means to those who were there and then let us look at our own resurrection moments... I'll be sharing my conversion, all tied up with Thomas, his doubts and belief. 

All wrapped up in resurrection praise!

 

THE LAUNCH AND READINGS FROM UNITY PILGRIM: THE LIFE OF FR GERRY REYNOLDS CSsR

 

BOOK LAUNCH 

of

UNITY PILGRIM - THE LIFE OF FR GERRY REYNOLDS CSsR

by GLADYS GANIEL

WEDNESDAY MAY 22nd, 2019 @ 7.15pm

CLONARD MONASTERY, BELFAST

rsvp ccarmichael@redcoms.org

 

FR GERRY REYNOLDS, KEN NEWELL & FITZROY

Readings by GLADYS GANIEL

from her book

UNITY PILGRIM - THE LIFE OF FR GERRY REYNOLDS CSsR

SUNDAY JUNE 2nd 2019 @ 7pm

FITZROY WELCOME AREA, 77 University Street

 

Fr Gerry Reynolds, whom we lost in 2016, impacted every one he met from hardened paramilitaries to pious Protestants. His ministry for Christ knew no bounds. He stepped across every human constructed boundary, every time he left Clonard Monastery to compassionately shares passion for Jesus. 

Gladys Ganiel, whose day job is in The Senator George J Mitchell Insitute For Global Peace, Security and Justice at Queens University Belfast is the perfect biographer. Gladys's academic field includes peacemaking, ecumenism and Catholicism in Ireland and she knew Fr Gerry and Clonard just as well.. I am excited to be plugging the book and these evenings.

 

IT IS FINISHED... THE NEW LIFE STARTS HERE... EASTER WEEKEND 2019 IN FITZROY

IT IS FINISHED

Good (Discomfortable) Friday

in Fitzroy

April 19th @ 7.30pm

Paul Bowman and Steve Stockman (that's me!) will lead us in some reflections on Holy Week in songs, poems and readings... leading us to the cross. There will be communal worship. some of Steve's poetry and Paul will perform Steve Hindalong's Beautiful Scandalous Night and Dustin Kensrue's It Is Finished. It will take place in the Fitzroy Welcome Area and we will gather around the cafe tables for an intimate communion.

 

THE NEW LIFE STARTS HERE

Resurrection Sunday

in Fitzroy

April 21st@ 11am

Fitzroy women will declare that He Is Risen and we will head on out to investigate the new life that starts with that stone being rolled away. We will be asking what we make of this declaration andI will share how Thomas's doubts burst through my doubts when as a 17 year old atheist resurrection brought me a new life! 

 

BARBARA BROWN TAYLOR in Conversation with PÁDRAIG Ó TUAMA

Corrymeela Presents

HOLY ENVY: FINDING GOD IN THE FAITH OF OTHER

BARBARA BROWN TAYLOR

in conversation with Pádraig Ó Tuama

Sunday 26th May @ 7pm

Fitzroy Church. 

 FREE... donation accepted; books also available.

Barbara Brown Taylor left parish ministry to teach world religion at a college in rural Georgia. To her surprise, what she learnt from decades of living with the truth claims of the world’s great faiths is not – contrary to popular opinion – that all religions are alike, but something subtler, more mysterious and more life–giving: a ‘holy envy’ of the riches of other traditions, and the chance to be born afresh and more deeply within her own tradition.

In this very special evening, Barbara, in conversation with Pádraig Ó Tuama, will share some of the gifts, questions and paradoxes that she found along the way. If there is only one God, why are there so many religions? Can our faith be improved by the faith of others, even those we fundamentally disagree with? And is the Holy Spirit at work in all this?

The Revd Barbara Brown Taylor is an American Episcopal priest, theologian, Professor of Religion, and New York Times best–selling author. In 2014 TIME magazine named her as one of its 100 most influential people in the world. Her best–selling guides to the spiritual life include An Altar on the World and Learning to Walk in the Dark. Her new book is Holy Envy: Finding God in the Faith of Others (Canterbury Press 2019).

TOMORROW IN FITZROY - 14.4.19

Tomorrow morning (11am) in Fitzroy we will be taking ALL of the family through Holy Week. With puppets we will follow Jesus into Jerusalem on a donkey and hear a Rich Mullins' song, performed by Paul Boeman, as commentary. Then we will go further into the week and with a "liturgical" song written by Damien Rice, performed by Dave Thompson, we will gather round a huge wooden cross and share family communion. The clear message will be as Christ invites us and Rice sings it:

And if all that you are
Is not all you desire,

 

Then, come

Come, let yourself be wrong
Come, it's already begun

Come, come alone
Come with fear, come with love
Come however you are
Just come, come alone
Come with friends, come with foes
Come however you are...

(Damien Rice - Trusty and True)

 

There is a lunch to follow and all are welcome...

 

In the evening (7pm) we gather again fro some modern worship and a reflection from Paul Bowman under the title The Passion. 

EASTER AT FITZROY 2019

PALM SUNDAY MORNING (APRIL 14, 2019) @ 11am

COME AS YOU ARE

A Family Service

Puppets and Family Communion based on a Damien Rice song

(Last Lunch afterwards)

 

PALM SUNDAY EVENING (APRIL 14, 2019) @ 7pm

PASSION

with modern orship and Reflection

 

GOOD FRIDAY (APRIL 19, 2019) @ 7.30pm

Readings, Songs and Reflections

with a 

Coffee Table Communion 

 

EASTER SUNDAY MORNING (APRIL 21, 2019) @ 11am

Resurrection Sunday Celebration

 

BBC RADIO ULSTER RADIO SERVICE (APRIL 28, 2019) @ 10.15

RESURRECTION LIFE STARTS HERE

TOMORROW IN FITZROY - 7.4.19

Tomorrow morning (11am) we will be looking at the power of love. Whatever we go through in life, whether our own healing or vocational fulfilment or the transformation of our given social space, love is the energising force for redemption, restoration, reconciliation, wholeness and salvation. We will be hearing a recent story, used in a song by Martyn Joseph, about how love saved a man from suicide even though he didn't know where the love came from for sixty years and embed ourselves in the home of Lazarus, Mary and Martha when Mary pours ex[pensive perfume over Jesus feet. Did Jesus need loved? Did this loving act of Mary see Jesus through his betrayal, torture and crucifixion. Have we lost the vulnerability of Jesus humanity because we know he was God? Phew! In our worship it is classical week with Ulster Orchestra's viola Richard Guthrie and the near jazz piano of David Livingstone! 

In the evening (7pm) we have the next in our brilliant Bible Literacy Course. We are up as far as Ruth and Roz Stirling will lead us into that book's context to help us as we read it now. 

info on Bible Literacy Course here

BRENDAN MCMANUS SJ & JIM DEEDS' BOOK LAUNCH IN FITZROY

BRENDAN MCMANUS SJ and JIM DEEDS

launch their new book

DEEPER INTO THE MESS; Praying Through Tough Times

FITZROY, 77 University Street, Belfast

SUNDAY MAY 19th, 2019 @ 7pm

 

We are delighted that Brendan and Jim have chosen Fitzroy to launch the second of their books together. It is a follow up to their previous book Finding God In The Mess. Both have also written books on their own, Brendan's Redemption Road; Grieving On The Camino and Jim's poetry books Surfing Life's Waves and Gym For The Soul.

Deeper Into The Mess again looks at life in the mess of our lives but sees the mess as doors into deeper experience of God. 

I am looking forward to interviewing my mates on the night; Jim is a fellow 4 Corners Festival Board member with me and Brendan and I share a love of U2!

Expect poetry and songs from these multi-talented boys and also some insightful spiritual truth. 

 

 

 

TOMORROW IN FITZROY - 31.3.19

Tomorrow in Fitzroy (11am) raises a dilemma. How do you preach the most familiar of all parables without the congregation nodding off. The Prodigal Son is a favourite parable of mine but for tomorrow I am looking at it from every possible angle to see what might connect with whoever is gathered tomorrow. It's Mother's Day here in Belfast and though the mother is absent in this family drama, the idea of home is large in my thoughts. Dave Thompson has thrown in a Martyn Joseph song to add another angle. As Saturday speeds into evening I am loving the imaginings still to come and then preaching it tomorrow!

BEKI HEMINGWAY IN FITZROY

BEKI HEMINGWAY

in concert

FITZROY COFFEE AREA

SATURDAY MAY 11, 2019 @ 7.30pm

donation based concert

 

Beki Hemingway might not look like she is old enough but she has been making music for three decades, singing as a teenager with Larry Norman, before joining This Train with future Rich Mullins' Ragamuffin Mark Robertson, before marrying guitarist Randy Kerkman and setting out as a solo artist, with Randy riding side saddle on guitar. 

I came across Hemingway listening to the very first Paste Music Sampler CD. Sinsick caught my ear and soul. Beki's voice had a purity but enough quirk to hook me in, and the song had this spirituality in poetry and tune. 

I was delighted to have Beki gig in Derryvolgie Hall when I lived there and was then gutted when she gave up music and took off to six years of normal life in Denver.

How pleased was I when Beki and Randy not only re-discovered their muse but moved to Ireland, first in Wexford and now latterly in Dundalk. With the help of Commitments guitarist Conor Brady they produced the Americana sounding record Whins and Weather, that took us through Beki's struggle with breast cancer. 

The proximity to Belfast has allowed me to have Beki at the last two 4 Corners Festivals and they have also played that last two Belfast Nashville Songwriting Festivals too.

We are delighted to welcome them back to Fitzroy on May 11th. If you love good songs and a great voice then look no further!