Community

I had the message below from DAMARIS – www.damaris.org. Do take a look.

Damaris has a wonderful website, full of great resources on current books, films and music – and their latest offering is of special interest to Acivate Your Life.

Last Chance Harvey (UK release 5th June) is a heartfelt romance that celebrates new beginnings – at any age. Dustin Hoffman plays Harvey, a creative composer about to lose his dead-end job as a jingle writer. Emma Thompson plays Kate, a sensitive 40-something whose life is limited to work, the occasional humiliating blind date and endless phone calls from her smothering mother. A chan ce encounter in an airport leads to a growing connection between them – but can they really find romance at their age, with their experience of past failures and pain?

This film will appeal to men and women of all ages. But it will have a particular resonance with women. Therefore, in partnership with Momentum Pictures, the film’s distributors, we are creating a FREE set of resources, including some designed specifically for women’s groups.

We want to help you to run an outreach event based around seeing the film in the cinema and then coming back for food, drink and discussion on these themes:

1. Regretfully Yours – living with past failures and regrets
2. Take a Chance on Me – overcoming the fear of pain and disappointment in new relationships
3. New Beginnings – the prospect of reconciliation, and establishing good relationships old and new
We will provide everything you need, including…

Artwork from the film for posters and invites
A leader’s guide with:
food/drink suggestions (e.g. a Last Chance Harvey Wallbanger!)
a trivia-quiz based on the film
discussion material and suggestions for using it
Downloadable clips from the film for you to show as you lead each part of the discussion
All of these will be available from www.damaris.org/lastchanceharvey and all will be free of charge.

We will also provide a special edition of Pollard on Film (Last Chance Harvey and Relationships), a special edition of the new look Culturewatch.tv (Last Chance Harvey and Real Life) and six downloadable clips from the film with suggestions for use, all open access in toolsfortalks.com

Please will you pass this information on to others – and plan to use our resources to run an outreach event as soon as possible after 5th June?

This email is sent out by: Damaris, PO Box 200, Southampton, SO17 2DL, UK. Email: office@damaris.org – to get these resources.

‘To boldly Go’ has to be the most famous split infinitive in history. I explained this to my son when we went to see Star Trek, new film, last night but the point was lost on him because he didn’t know what a split infinitive was!
Grammatic issues aside, the film was fantastic.I heartily recommend it. Throughly enjoyable, it took me right back to my adolescence, when I watched just about every episode of the TV series. It is a ‘prequel’ in other words it tells the story of how the team Kirk, Spock, Bones, Scotty and the rest all came to together. It has almost all the bits in the original series that we really loved: the over-emotional Bones taking Spock off to one side to harangue him only to be greeted with a cooly raised eyebrow and the ‘logical’ response. There was plenty of ‘Beam me up Scotty’ moments and almost a ‘she canny take any more cap’en’. The only thing missing was the polystyrene rocks and the ship’s internal doors that went ‘swishup’! Remember those?
My advice would be don’t worry about following the plot, just enjoy the action and the good looking guys. We thought the script was hilarious but the rest of the audience must have been die-hard ‘Trekkies’ as no one else was laughing.
There was alot of time travel involved but it wont give too much away to say that at two points in the film two different characters each use something that they haven’t yet invented but they will invent in the future. ‘Neat idea’ I thought! Could I please spend the royalities now of the bestseller I haven’t yet written?
It set me thinking: what else would I do differently now if I knew that something in the future was a dead cert? It didn’t take me long to think about Heaven, if I really believe that eternity is a ‘dead cert’ (excuse the pun) then how much more motivated should I be to ‘bodly go’?
For more on this theme, read the poem Fiona posted up called ‘My Friend’. Let’s encourage one another to boldly go with the good news.

This is the article that we submitted to our church magazine after our swishing event.

Well, we’ve done it! Our first ever SWISH. It was a fun evening – ladies brought along their items of clothing and/or accessories (shoes, handbags, belts, jewellery) which they no longer wanted – ready to swish with others.

Since last Thursday, various ladies have been out and about with their swished items, spreading the word! Swishing is great fun and it works!

We feel another swish coming on – hopefully to incorporate children’s clothes too. What do you think?

Jo & I both felt hugely supported by our Church family – before, during and after the event – as a form of outreach, making chruch accessible to those who wouldn’t normally come along. Thank you too, to those who kept the evening ‘flowing’ with refreshments, setting up and clearing up again.

Sarah O’Shea brought something special to the evening. Her choice of songs, and the natural warmth she exudes whilst performing, endeared her to us all. (How else would you explain the line-dance?)

We recognise swishing is not everybody’s cup of tea, however, our next event is all-inclusive (ok fellas!) and will be held on a Saturday afternoon. So ‘take a chance’ (on us) and we will keep you informed about an “Abba-solutely” fabulous time for Mamma-mias and Papas alike!!! No age limits.

Pupils facing exams this month can look to a new source of revision aid this year, with the publication of a set of downloadable prayer cards from the Christian Today website.

The brief prayers call for God’s help in revising in preparation for the stressful time of exams asking for a sense of calm and focus.

To read this article please go to www.christiantoday.com/article/church.uploads.crammers.prayer.as.exam.period.looms/23270.htm

Or to download the free exam resources please go to www.cofe.anglican.org/exams

Pastor Rick Warren has been included in Time magazine’s latest list of the World’s Most Influential People as well as Michelle Obama. To read the article from Christian Today, go to their link www.christiantoday.com/article/rick.warren.one.of.worlds.most.influential.people/2…