The Missional Network

10/23/2024

Facebook friends - I've been hacked. Be aware and careful about messages from me. Al R

10/20/2024

Greetings, Friends!

Season Two of Leaving Egypt is off to a great start.

In September launched our monthly "Conversations".
You'll have an opportunity to be in conversation this month with Martin Robinson - from Ep #24, Missional: Newbigin and Our Unravelling - and Harvey Kwiyani - from Ep #20, Why the West needs to receive the gifts of African Christians Both Harvey and Martin bring rich grassroots experience.

To register click here to receive the Zoom link: https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZAvdOCspzsrEtGgN-c6HqXdH1D3FVcZazlJ

Please join us - feel free to bring your own stories and questions or just join to listen quietly if you prefer. We look forward to being together! 😊

Welcome! You are invited to join a meeting: Leaving Egypt Conversations - with Harvey Kwiyani and Martin Robinson. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email about joining the meeting.

10/16/2024

As a Canadian I am honoured and thrilled to have had David Cayley as a podcast guest this month. David has been a writer, broadcaster and documentary maker for more than 30 years. Known for documenting the philosophy of 20th Century Christian intellectuals like Ivan Illich, George Grant, and Rene Girard, he is the author of many books and has received many awards. David is the pre-eminent authority on his friend, the priest philosopher, Ivan Illich. Give a listen to this podcast. Here the voice of a brilliant man as he shares insights and recollections of Ivan Illich.

Hosted by Al Roxburgh and Jenny Sinclair

10/10/2024

We have some fantastic LEAVING EGYPT podcasts for you this Fall. We listened to God transforming a community through a local Pentecostal congregation in Lincoln, UK. We sat with a wonderful Canadian broadcaster as he shared his experiences with Ivan Illich and we dialogued with a Catholic Worker in St Paul (MN)about Peter Maurin and Dorothy Day in their radical call to be the church in the local and among the poor.

These are testimonies to the quite, off-the-map ways the Spirit is forming communities of hope when it's too easy to be Eeyore.

We begin with Sian Wade pastoring in a deprived area of Lincoln (UK). She shares her journey from doing “good things” to discerning what God is doing among the people in her neighbourhood. As she led her church into relationship with the poor they've discovered being church is more about being with people than running programmes. Asking what it might look like to do “authentic church” led Sian to discern brokenness - in our relationship with God, in ourselves, with each other and with the earth. She bears witness that church is beautiful and messy, holding a tension between a prophetic posture alongside multiple partnerships and being a local community. Bridge Church, aptly named, is practising a theology of unity and reconciliation with other churches. Together as fellow Christians, they pray, work and partner for the transformation of their city.

Hosted By Al Roxburgh and Jenny Sinclair

09/23/2024

To our Leaving Egypt subscribers, here an invitation you may have missed:

Alongside our regular episodes, join us for “Conversations”, a space for our subscribers, to meet each other, for sharing and cross fertilisation. We begin this month – Wednesday, September 25th – 6pm UK, 10am Vancouver, 1pm New York.

Each "Conversation" will be joined by a guest bringing rich grassroots experience. This time Roy Searle is with us (Ep #13 – Places of Hope in the Unravelling). Roy is a co-founder of the Northumbria Community and brings deep gifts of Celtic spirituality. He has wide experience of how the church is changing and the challenges to leadership - he’s seen it all. He’ll begin with some insight around the unraveling and our practices then we’ll open up to conversation.

Join us and bring your own stories and questions or just listen quietly if you prefer. We look forward to being together! 😊

Here’s the link to register your place:

Welcome! You are invited to join a meeting: Leaving Egypt Conversations - with Roy Searle. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email about joining the meeting.

09/16/2024

Many of you will be familiar with Paul Kingsnorth (https://paulkingsnorth.substack.com/). A few weeks ago, Jenny and I interviewed Paul, exploring with him the notion of "Machine" as a primary metaphor for the world we all live in. But, far more than that, we delved into questions of how we live as God's people in this unraveling. This took us into Christian tradition, practices and ways of forming each other in lives grounded in the local. Paul has become an important counter voice. As we wrestle with questions of following Jesus in this moment Paul has important things to say. Listen in on the conversation as we explore how to live as Christians in this age.

https://leavingegyptpodcast.substack.com/p/ep26-being-church-in-the-age-of-the

09/14/2024

https://vimeo.com/47464864?share=copy

From 14 years ago

Alan Roxburgh

09/13/2024

Here's our latest LE podcast with PAUL KINGSNORTH. As one subscriber responded: "Just wanted to say thank you for the latest podcast, with Paul Kingsnorth. Absolutely riveting, and full of challenging truth. What a story he has to tell! I had to stop what I was doing to listen properly, and have forwarded the link to a few friends." Please feel free to forward the link to friends - Paul is engaging with important questions about the nature of Christian life in our "machine" age.

Hosted by Al Roxburgh and Jenny Sinclair

09/12/2024

Friends, we're beginning Season Two of Leaving Egypt.
Alongside our regular episodes, we’d love to invite you to join us monthly for “Conversations”, a space for you, our subscribers, to meet each other. You each have such valuable grassroots experience and we hope this can be a space for sharing and cross fertilisation. We begin this month – Wednesday, September 25th – 6pm UK, 10am Vancouver, 1pm New York.
Each time we’ll be joined by a guest bringing rich grassroots experience.

This time Roy Searle will be with us - you may remember Roy from Ep #13 – Places of Hope in the Unravelling. Roy is a co-founder of the Northumbria Community and brings deep gifts of Celtic spirituality. He has wide experience of how the church is changing and the challenges to leadership - he’s seen it all. He’ll begin with some suggestions that can enrich local ministry, and then we’ll open up to a wider conversation.

Please join us - feel free to bring your own stories and questions if you like - and remember there is no such thing as a “stupid” question. Or just join to listen quietly if you prefer. We look forward to being together! 😊
Here’s the link to register your place:

Welcome! You are invited to join a meeting: Leaving Egypt Conversations - with Roy Searle. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email about joining the meeting.

09/11/2024

Yesterday, Jenny Sinclair and I had a Leaving Egypt podcast interview with an amazing Canadian, David Cayley (https://www.davidcayley.com/works). The date for posting the podcast will be October 8.
I just want to acknowledge David as a hidden gem, an amazing intellectual whose voice is an gift to all of us seeking to understand this present moment. His writings on the work of Ivan Illich remains so important to this time. I've no other purpose here but to express my deep appreciation for David and his work.

08/26/2024

Living in the Commons: We had our neighbourhood pot luck Saturday evening. Neighbourhoods contain the world! Five families turned up. We know each other pretty well. We're good at borrowing and helping each other out. It was a relaxed evening together. When it looked like everyone had come, there was a knock at the door - four strangers with bright smiles hoping for a welcome.
We didn't know who they were. Brian, from across the street, had been invited but couldn't come, so he'd sent over his new tenants (I guess he really trusts us). We had not idea who they were. It was a bit awkward at first but soon we were all chatting and figuring out who was who. Rayna is from Jamaica. She had he dad and brother in tow since they were on vacation. Schub is from India and came with such a bright smile. Both Ryana and Schub had to Canada on student visas. They were staying with three-year work visas.They'd met at school and decided to room together (housing costs are bad in Vancouver - they'd pay at least $2500/month for a two bedroom basement apartment).
We'd discovered new neighbours and laughed together that in that room that night was Jamaica, Iran, India, China, Czech Republic, England and "Canada". What an amazing mix of peoples we'd have never known without Dagmar and Behar taking the plunge to invite us all together. As Jane and I went home we both looked at each other and said "Pizza - next Friday night?" We'll have Rayna, her dad and brother, with Schub over for pizza on the deck. Who knows where this journey might take us in God's economy?

08/19/2024

My phone pinged one evening last week. It was just as I was heading for bed, book in hand. It was a text message from my next door neighbour Barb (not the real names of people). She and her husband and Tom, have lived beside us for about five years. They’re great people, with busy professional lives, trying to raise their two girls. Jane and I talk with them regularly over the fence. We’ve had them over for Friday night pizza, making our own pizzas in the pizza oven beside the BBQ. Over the decade we’ve lived in our neighbourhood, we've hosted and shared meals with many neighbours. Pete and Diane live a few doors down. We’ve had them over for evenings around the fire and of course - pizza! Peter is retired. He and I have a good time complaining about all the construction going on from the hospital beside us and the parking issues on the street. Diane is a fitness trainer. They've turned their garage into a mini-gym (which inspired me to do the same). On weekend mornings, a gang of women are running up and down the alleyway, talking breathlessly to one another, followed by stretches in the garage.

The late night text from Barb was an invitation. She and Diane are planning a “little gathering” this weekend at their home and were wondering if Jane and I were available. That simple invitation brought immense joy as I settled into bed that evening. There’s nothing earth shattering about such an invitation, but it feels huge and wonderful. It’s a welcomed gift, signaling a shift in us from hosts to guests, move toward deeper mutuality and friendship. I’m looking forward to what unfolds.