As you may already know little Johhny has declared this Sunday a national day of mourning for the tsunami victims.
I know it has impacted people round here fairly significantly so we have arranged for a remembrance event at our place for our church community, our friends and neighbours.
It was as I was thinking of who to invite that I realised how many people we have got to know in the last year or so. I think we finished up inviting around 15 families, who would not see themselves as part of our church community to join us, and so far about 8 have said they will be there. One of them is the tow truck driver who brought me home when the cruiser carked it and another the mobile mechanic who has helped me work on it. Its great to see how networks form as we get to know each other and live closeby.
Add 4 families from church and a few of their friends and it’ll be a big gig…
The plan is pretty simple :
– eat and drink from 5.30-7.30
– have a short reflective time from 7.30 to 8.00 at the latest. This will involve an ‘imagine’ experience, perhaps question raising, prayer, a short thought from yours truly and anything anyone wants to contribute.
– an opportunity to reflect some more at a space we will create in our backyard with a looping PP pres with ‘God Weeps Too’ as audio, and various prayers on the wall – hope, confusion, anger, consolation. People will be invited to pray the prayer that fits with where they are at and then to light a candle etc etc. This will be a purely optional thing, but my guess is that many will at least explore it.
I am hoping that we will create a space and place for all in the community who want to, to come and do something meaningful and signifcant to remember the tragedy that has been.