• Read thurible.net by email

    One of the surprises for me in keeping the blog over the last year or so has been how many people have taken up the opportunity to read thurible.net by email.

    I’d kind of thought that email was old fashioned technology and in many ways it is. But lots of people use old fashioned tech all the time. Just look at the number of people gazing with love at the vinyl records in any charity shop.

    The people who have megablogs tend to be quite keen on keeping a mailing list. Those who are making serious money from blogging always say that you need to grow your mailing list and then sell things to people in order to make your dough.

    Even though I’m not in the business of making megabucks from the blog, I took the trouble of inviting people to subscribe to receive posts by email quite a while ago. There are now somewhere between 300 and 350 people who receive the blog by email. In the grand scheme of things, that’s not huge. Very many bloggers have huge lists. However, it is far more than I had guessed would be interested. To put it into perspective, that’s higher than the number of people who come to St Mary’s on most Sundays.

    There was a trend some years ago to depart from pulpits and preach sermons wandering amongst the people. I tend to think that preachers should see pulpits everywhere.

    Anyway, here’s a shoutout to those who receive by email. Thanks for taking the trouble.

    Anyone wanting to join them can do so right here and right now.

    Enter your email address:

    Delivered by FeedBurner

5 responses to “Sermon preached on 8 January 2012”

  1. […] on Sunday, Fr Chucks celebrated his first Holy Communion and Evensong as a Priest. Provost Kelvin preached a delightfully personal sermon addressed to Chucks in which he drew some parallels between the season of Epiphany and […]

  2. DementedBonxie Avatar
    DementedBonxie

    It’s not really so hard to pronounce Chukwuemeka. Divide it into 2 parts: Chukwu / emeka
    You can surely manage ‘chook – woo’
    and ‘ay – may – kah’ (maybe the ‘ay’ should be ‘eh’ ?) Stress on ‘may’ I think.

    Even doing him the honour of saying one or other half of his name would be something! I believe its meaning is ‘God has done something great’ . Chucks seems somewhat undignified by comparison. So we might at least do something decent and make our muscles work a little differently.

    But then, I’m an enthusiast for the idea that the learning to use muscles differently is an important part of a process of getting to appreciate another person & culture.

    All that aside, a fine sermon, thanks.

    1. kelvin Avatar

      Thanks DementedBonxie

      I don’t really have trouble with his name – I’ve got used to baptising lots of babies with Igbo names in recent years.

      Chucks is the name that he is happy to go by amongst both Igbo and English speakers.

      We did decide the other night that Bishop Gregor did need to use Chukwuemeka in full at the ordination.

  3. Jaye Avatar

    I found both Friday and Sunday very emotional. Occasions like these days affirm my own belief in God. It was wonderful to see Chuks ordained by the Bishop but the huge hug you gave Chuks and your smile as you were doing it said it all for me 🙂 He’s a treasure, and such an amazing addition to our clergy team-truly a God-given gift to us. It just speaks volumes for inclusion, diversity, tolerance, and all those other qualities I feel are so lacking in other denominations ( including the one from which I come).
    I thought your sermon was wonderfully moving and I don’t mind admit to shedding tears as you spoke, and as Fr Chuks gave the blessing at the conclusion of the service, and at Evensong too, but I’m like that over things I really care about in this world.

    I know it’s been a journey requiring patience, application, and negotiation. Thank you Kelvin for your part in making this wonderful thing come to pass.

  4. Kimberly Avatar

    The middle part of the sermon was dedicated, I presume, to Tilly, of blessed memory.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Previous Posts

  • Online at Synod

    Having made rather a fuss about the lack of internet access in the General Synod Hall (aka Palmerston Place Chuch), I was delighted to find that wifi access had been enabled this year. However, it soon transpired that my own computer was the only one in the room which refused to connect to the wifi…

  • Normal Service is Resumed

    I’m back from my retreat. I’ve had a great time away. I was on a clergy retreat. The topic was priesthood. The venue was Spain. The sun shone and I was with a great group of people. I’ll not be blogging further about the retreat because it was, well, it was a retreat. However, when…

  • Blog Off

    I’m on retreat for a week. Oh yes. Am turning comment moderation on whilst I am away. Will be beyond e-mail, facebook, & mobile contact. Expect to be blogging from the synod. See you then.

  • Sermon – 1 June 2008

    [audio:Sermon 1 June 2008.mp3] For audio, click the icon above. Text below. Usual disclaimers. I didn’t say what the text says. Here it is: I don’t preach on St Paul very often, but this seems to me to be important this week, so I am going to preach on the second of our readings, from…