Invisible College presents Inspiring Creativity, an evening of visual art and music pondering what it means to be created and creative.

Featured local artists and musicians include: 

• Vocalist Jeanine Noyes
• Artist Shari Doseger
• Jazz Guitarist Dave Barton
• Singer/Songwriter Sarah Baetz
• Photographer Mieke Van Geest
• Pop-folk duo Kyra and Tully.

Saturday, April 4^th at next church, 89 Colborne St. Gallery doors, 6:30pm for art show and reception, Concert begins at 7:30pm. Tickets $5-10 at the door.

invisiblecollege 2009
Monday evenings, Jan 12-Feb 02 7-9pm McLaughlin Room, JDUC
plus Saturday Feb 07 workshops 2-5 pm and concert-in-a-gallery 7-9 pm @ next, 89 Colborne Street

Jan 12
John Franklin (Imago) A biblical orientation to the arts and an introduction to the work of Imago in Canada.

Jan 19
Katerina Atanassova (Varley Gallery, Markham) Being involved in the arts. Life as a curator. What difference does Christian faith make?

Jan 26
David Lyon (Queen’s University) Appreciating art and music, Christianly. The work of Hans Rookmaaker as a signpost.

Feb 02
Susan Norman interviews local Christians in the arts, plus panel discussion. How do they see their work and their calling? Who are their role models?*

Feb 07 - Saturday
Afternoon: 6 workshops (3×2) on various aspects of art and music practices, techniques, styles, flowing out of the discussions of the course.

Evening: Concert-in-a-gallery: mixed-genre music in mixed-media artspace, both featuring local talent.

Readings:

Steve Turner Imagine: A Vision for Christians in the Arts, IVP 2001
Madeleine L’Engle Walking on Water: Reflections on Faith and Art, Shaw 2001

Resources: Imago

Download City Life Session 1 Notes

Most people living in cities have mixed feelings. Some delight in everyday sights and sounds from their sidewalk, nodding to neighbours and relishing the rhythms of urban lifestyles. Other lament the lack of peace, bemoan the busy streets or even fear to venture out into the downtown core.This course embraces such ambivalence, seeing such mixed feelings as part of our human makeup, but also reaching back to discover the meaning of the city and forward to find out how our best hopes might be realized. And how we might be part of the good news for the city as actively involved citizens.

That context is found in Christian reflection on and engagement with the urban world, from the symbolically sinful sites of Sodom or Babylon to the joyful New Jerusalem where light and life are full and free. The course aims to help us “read” today’s city in fresh ways and to “relate” to it, rolling up our sleeves to get right in there.

The course aims to understand city life in general, but Kingston is the focus. We’ll use our own city as a source of case-studies for study and action. Expect illustrated, interactive talks on aspects of Christianity and urban life in Kingston and around the world, opportunities for

discussion of central themes, and edgy, practical components obliging us to think about our own responsibility as Christians in the city.

(image: facade, 2005, abi lyon wicke)

Urban experience, biblical drama - January 14

The drama of the city as dynamic theme of the Bible. How do Christians live in the city? The majority of the world’s population now live in urban spaces. How does this affect us? Are there any “sacred spaces” left in today’s cities? How do we get to know our streets and workplaces?

A city evolves - January 21

Kingston: from native site to military base to industrial centre to services and tourism. The daily life and power-struggles of the limestone city. The seamy underside: Sodom and Babylon as symbolically evil cities. Can we make a difference?

Hope for the city - January 28

Who cities are for? The differences made by good and bad design. Why God cares about the aesthetics and the environment of the city. How dreams become practicable: the task of implementation. Does painting the porch; planting a tree; joining your neighbourhood association help?

A rainbow city - February 04

Who lives in this place and what difference does it make? Aristotle said it’s not a city if the people are the same: was he right? Ethnic diversity in Kingston: the world in our backyard. Splintered spiritualities? Religious diversity in Kingston. Richness of diversity in the New Jerusalem. How does it feel to be different? Knowing our neighbours, welcoming recent arrivals.

The good of the city - February 11

Why Christians live in two cities; citizens with dual attachments. Kingston and Kingdom some times clash but real responsibilities and challenges must be faced. Seeking the welfare of the city: building community. How do we mobilize churches in urban neighbourhoods?

Course materials: Sidewalks of the Kingdom: The New Urbanism and Christian Faith, by Eric Jacobsen (2003)

Where: McLaughlin Room, JDUC, Queen’s University (except Jan 28 at John Orr, Queen’s University)

When: 7:00-9:00 Monday evenings January 14-February 11

Register: Call (613)544-7573 or email invisiblecollegekingston@gmail.com

Cost: $30, $15 low/no wage and students (includes beverage, snack)

Here’s the MP3 for the second week of Invisible College 2007.

Risky Rest – Going Against the Current
January 22, 2007 Email, cell phones; they squeeze the snooze, destroy down-time. Lie down and be counted. –Susan Norman, Graduate and Faculty Fellowship, Queen’s University

Here’s the MP3 for the first week of Invisible College 2007.

Patterns for Person and Planet
January 15, 2007 Sabbath is part of the social DNA for human and earthly existence. Deny the rest… and you deny the rest.–David Lyon, Queen’s University

readings
A course outline and package of readings (marked * below) will be available at the course venue. Further readings will be added during the course. The readings are complementary to and should enrich the sessions.

The main course book is Norman Wirzba Living the Sabbath (Brazos 2006), available at a discount on January 15.

Other recommended books include:
Marva Dawn The Sense of the Call: A Sabbath Way of Life for those who serve God, the Church and the World, (Eerdmans 2006)
Abraham Heschel The Sabbath, (Farrar, Strauss and Giroux, 2005)
Jürgen Moltmann God in Creation, (SCM 1985)

coffee break

Please bring your travel mug for the refreshment break.

visible outline
___________________________________
January 15 Patterns for Person and Planet

David Lyon, Queen’s Research Chair and Professor of Sociology.

Ever had that panicky feeling you’ve forgotten something really important? Our multi-tasking, mobile, global, 24/7 liquid society careers along, suffering from a chronic amnesia; the loss of Sabbath. Don’t think starchy Presbyterians holding out against Sunday shopping, or rigid rule-keeping legalists! Think deep about the basic architecture of creation: Sabbath as the limits of human control in time and space and as the moment and the place for delight, joyful celebration, reorientation, healing and hope! Starting with the Jewish Shabbat, then exploring Sabbath in creation, in command and in Christ, we move to Sabbath as a radically different way of life. A counter-cultural adventure.

Reading: Wirzba chapters 1, 2. ‘Principles of Embracing the Sabbath’ ccojubilee.org/resources/theology/Sabbath/3.html/ Heather Menzies and Janice Newson ‘No time to think’ Academic Matters December 2006.*

__________________________________________
January 22 Risky Rest: Going Against the Current

Susan Norman, Graduate and Faculty Fellowship, Queen’s.

‘Busyness is my business’ seems to be the ironic tagline of many today. However did we allow ourselves to think that constantly increasing productivity is a good thing? Employer expectations, dual career upwardly mobile lifestyles and the whole massive machine of global capitalism militate against Sabbath. The tensions are real but some businesses have recognized the problem. Paradoxically, Christians may have to struggle to get rest. Could 24/7 lifestyles count as idolatry? What about under-employment? Is rest a recess (hole-to-be-filled) or recreation? Sabbath raises awkward and unsettling questions: what am I doing all this for? Is there another way, that does not place human ambition at the centre of life?

Reading: Wirzba chapters 3, 7.

________________________________________
January 29 Fallow and Fruiting: Land-Sabbath

Loren Wilkinson, Professor of Interdisciplinary Studies and Philosophy, Regent College, Vancouver; Mary-Ruth Wilkinson, Sessional Lecturer, Regent College.

If Sabbath is a creation pattern, this is good news for the earth as well as for persons. God delights in creation; do we? Human futures, biblically, are bound up with the destiny of the planet. In their way, agribusiness, GM foods, over-fishing and Clear-Cuts are just another side of the same processes and practices of late modernity that tend to obliterate Sabbath for the earth, the land, as for humankind. But there’s hope here too and fresh starts can be and are being made. Do Levitical Laws have any relevance for today? How far can we have global menus and local food? The basic question is, whose earth is it anyway? Right questions set the scene for appropriate answers.

Reading: Wirzba chapters 9, 11; Wendell Berry ‘Out of your car, off your horse…’ (from Sex, Community, Freedom, Economy, (Pantheon 1994)*; Mathis Wackernagel ‘The Ecological Footprint’* (see also www.footprintnetwork.org).

______________________________________________________
February 5 Healed and Whole: Sabbath and Right Relationships

Janet Clark, Academic Dean and Associate Professor of Counselling, Tyndale University College and Seminary, Toronto.

Jesus, notably, healed on the Sabbath, to the disgust of the legalists. This suggests that joyful liberation from the burdens of physical life in a fractured world is an important part of the ‘Sabbath made for humans’ (not humans made for Sabbath). Where does this take us in ‘light living’ terms? What counts as Sabbath ‘working’ and why? Luke 13: 10-17 seems key: the bent-over woman, pronounces Jesus, is a daughter of Abraham. Mind-blowing. Sabbath is inseparable from mending what’s broken, especially repairing relationships at all levels; reflecting on what really matters – priority-therapy – and making practical differences. Families, friendships and neighbourhoods can express the hospitality and delight of God!

Reading: Wirzba chapters 6, 8.

______________________________________________
February 12 Free at Last! Living Lightly in New Earth

David Lyon

What is the ‘rest that remains’? This is the Sabbath as goal of life (which it should be each week, too). Living lightly in New-Heaven-and-Earth is a pattern pulling us into the future. It’s already but not yet. Not escapism but engagement! We live as foreign residents now but we don’t dream of ‘returning’ somewhere so much as finding the local regime changed such that we’re totally at home at last. The Sabbath is also jubilee – freedom and justice for the exhausted, the excluded, the trapped, the forgotten. Jesus calls us to live the future now to bring God’s delight, God’s goodness into everyday life at every level. What’s holding us back?

Reading: Wirzba chapters 4, 12.

As Wendell Berry says in his foreword, ‘Norman Wirzba’s book asks what kind of human life it takes to include the Sabbath. It is high time somebody asked. As this book shows, what is implied is a set of answers dangerous to ignore.’

You can read the teaser at Amazon.com

The course and the weekend don’t follow exactly the order of Wirzba’s book but you’ll soon see how they fit together!

Copies of the book will be available, at a small discount, on the first night of the course (January 15 2007).

Explore these themes through provocative plenary presentations, written materials and interactive small-group discussion in a five-week evening course. No assignments or credit. Think, talk, question, explore…

Who is the course for?
Anyone who puzzles about a proper balance in life and wants a fresh perspective on priorities. Anyone who wonders if the Bible says anything about corporate time, burn-out or life in fast lanes. Anyone wanting to get in synch with the spirit of deep heaven.

Where is it?
Mclaughlin Room, JDUC (see map)

When is it?
Starting January 15, 2007, every Monday night for 5 weeks, from 7:00 – 9:00 pm.

How do I register?
Click here to download brochure [PDF 300kb].

January 26 – 27, 2007
Food is central to who we are as humans, and as Christians. Jesus himself invites us to share the meal of communion. But, what do we eat? Where do we get it? Who gets to eat what? What do we do with waste? From cosmos to kitchen, how does food fit with a Biblical understanding of creation, grace and stewardship?

The conference combines thought-provoking plenary presentations and practical interactive workshops.

Featured speakers Loren and Mary Ruth Wilkinson are both teachers at Regent College in Vancouver, B.C. and active environmentalists.

Workshop topics include: how to compost and why; doing a Christian fridge audit; a guide to seasonal food eating; the joys and responsibility of Christian hospitality; ethical eating according to Leviticus; the globalization of food; feasting in a hungry world; and more! Also, special workshops for teens.

Weekend Program
Friday, January 26, 2007
7:00 pm: “Meals: Footprints of heaven or hell?”

Saturday, January 27, 2007
9:30 am: “Eating, Doing, Being: Where do all the Footprints Go?”
10:45 – 12:00 pm: Workshops
12:00 – 1:00 pm: Lunch provided
1:00 – 3:30 pm: Workshops
(All above sessions at Douglas Library)

4:00 pm: “Come and Eat: Communion as God’s Footprint”

5:00 pm: Eat at the World’s Dinner Table. Taste today’s global food struggles along with a nutritious family meal. For children and adults alike. (Communion and Meal at St. James’)

Children’s Saturday Program
9:00 am – 4:30 pm, St. James’ Church
Children ages 5-12 are invited to a fun, interactive and educational program while their parents or caregivers attend the adult gathering. Through music, stories, games, crafts with natural materials, outdoor play and a giant puppet show, the children will engage food issues at an age appropriate level. Nourishing snacks and lunch provided. For children under 5, free childcare is available.