flicker: oct '09

last week was busy. really busy. My diary was packed mostly with planning for flicker, which was less than a week away. I'd gone through a whole load of different options. Even cancelling. Most people who'd been in touch had let me know they weren't coming. Was it worth it at all?

Well, on the encouragement: 'at least prayer is happening in the cathedral', I decided to go for it. And, two days after flicker itself, I don't regret it at all.

It miraculously came together during the last week, with a lovely thread of 'loving God, loving each other and taking the gospel to the world'...we set up various stations in the chapels dotted around the cathedral, focussing on different expressions of prayer, ranging from creative, traditional, contemporary, praying in groups, interactive and a chilled out café to finish.

And, people actually came! Volunteers included, we had 70 people. And I know it's not about numbers, but numbers help when you're trying to 'make an opportunity for young people in the whole county to come to their cathedral and pray'...in fact, had we had any more, it would have been hard to cope. Especially for the interactive zone - a brilliant prayer installation called 'breathe'.

We hired 'Breathe' from our friends in Worcester. And I highly recommend it. It's a massive parachute type matt thing, split into 12 sections. Each section is somewhere to stop, think and interact with something hands on or visually. Each person gets an ipod shuffle, and the tracks talk you round different sections of the parachute, getting you to think about how you relate to and think about - yourself, others, the world, and your relationship with God.

Highly recommended. And overall, the atmosphere of peace and God's presence, on such a night as Oct 31st, was quite incredible. I'm so full of gratitude also to everyone who came and helped on the night - Ben and Nai were especially awesome, but everyone just being there was such a blessing. It was a very special time.