What is Serum? from Greenbelt Festival on Vimeo.

I’ve been digging around, and I’ve managed to find a couple of videos of Serum and the people involved in it. the first one (above) is and interview with Jane and Paul from last year’s Greenbelt. It gives a good sense of how the event works, and hopefully you can see that it’s relaxed, informal, and open to all.

I also shot another video last week. Both of these were filmed at the Greenbelt festival (the first one in 2009) It’s a bit of an odd one, doing Serum at Greenbelt, as the audience at the festival predominantly has some sort of religious background. In the main, there is a shared base of knowledge that means the discussion focusses round the shared knowledge, with a few notable exceptions. Have a look here:

Serum 2 from Michael Radcliffe on Vimeo.

However, this is not typical of Serum – it’s a little bit broader. It’s open to people who don’t necessarily share that broad base of knowledge but are interested in discussing matters of spirituality in whatever form it might take. It’s great to be a “spiritual” person, but it’s even better to see what happens when we share those beliefs and experiences with other people in a non-threatening informal environment.

So do give it a try. It’ll be interesting to see what the discussions throw up. If you’re thinking of coming to Serum, you can find out more details of the when and where here.

And of course, there’s already been two blog posts on Serum for you to find out a bit more. Look forward to seeing you there.

Three Christian peace activists were arrested at AWE Aldermaston after opening the base for disarmament. The three, Fr. Martin Newell (43), Passionist priest from the London Catholic Worker, Susan Clarkson (63) of the Oxford Catholic Worker,  and Chris Cole (47) also from Oxford,  cut a doorway into the outer fence of nuclear base. The group then attached a sign saying ‘Open for Disarmament: All Welcome’.  The three then entered the base, through the new gateway, knelt and prayed.

In a statement the three said: “We come to the Atomic Weapons Establishment at Aldermaston to open a new  gateway into this tightly guarded factory of death. We come inspired by the message of Jesus to love our enemies, to be peacemakers and to live and act nonviolently at all times. This week marks the 30^th anniversary of the first act of nuclear disarmament, the ‘Ploughshares 8’, and we act  inspired by that spirit of disarmament. We believe that AWE Aldermaston, and its extensive and expensive new development programme, needs to be exposed for what it is: a factory for the creation of weapons of mass destruction which have the power to destroy this beautiful world, given to us by God, our loving creator, to care and tend.

Ends

For further details contact Ciaron O’Reilly:  07939 290 576 ciaronx@yahoo.com

Photos available from:

London Catholic Worker website: http://www.londoncatholicworker.org/

I always enjoy and am inspired by doing the Serum discussions at Greenbelt. If I describe what we do it does not sound like much in terms of ‘putting on an event’ – we welcome everyone,  explain some simple ground rules, have someone give a very brief ‘thought for the day’ and ask a question which is then handed over to the small groups sitting around the tables to discuss and explore before feeding back at the end – yet I am always surprised by how such a simple formula can produce so profound an experience, “humbling and powerful” in the words of the journalist from the Guardian who attended last year.   On reflecting why this is the case I think it is a combination of tackling some of the biggest questions you can ask in an environment of respectful listening, where you are not out to win the argument but to share and learn from different perspectives and  experiences and in so doing start to find commonality as well as difference with others. This year we asked three different questions on the three occasions serum took place: how do our beliefs (whatever these happen to be) relate to and shape the way we actually behave?; do we only really search for god when we are desperate rather than comfortable?; is life all about winning and death all about losing?  In the process of discussing these questions you raise others which go deeper into the issue.

Re. life and death/winning and losing, my group asked how can we fully live in the reality of death which comes to us all, what does a ‘good life’ look like? what does a ‘good death’ look like? How can we process grief and loss?  Would the practice of wakes help us to come to terms with the reality of death by being in the presence of a dead body – how this can offer a strange comfort in that the person is no longer present, it is just the body that is left?

My experience of this discussion was that with the help of the others in my group we were able to look at something we don’t often look at together, a topic that is often avoided and can make us feel uncomfortable.  Serum provided us with some parameters in which to undertake this exploration, to take part in a considered and respectful reflection where the challenge of different perspectives and experiences can be heard in a non-defensive, non-confrontational manner.  At its best this is a process that I find converting in that it causes me to go back and question the way I see things.  It also provides a space in which I begin to find some common ground with others, that by sharing individual experience and thoughts it starts to become possible to share meanings and interpretations of that experience that translate across the divide.

For those interested in these kinds of discussions serum is happening every other Wednesday starting next week – see link for more details.

At this year’s Greenbelt festival, the Moot Community contributed three contemplative eco-spirituality services, Ian Mobsby gave one talk and facilitated a discussion on the emerging church, whilst Sarah Edwards gave a talk and contributed to a panel discussion.  This year, we played host to Mike Angell, and Ordinand involved in a neo-monastic type initiative in San Diego, Karen Ward, the Episcopal Priest and Abbess of the Church of the Apostles, Jon Myers Ordinand with the Bekon collective in Seattle and Eliacin Rosario-Cruz, new monastic also from Seattle.  It was a great success, packed out services and talks all round.  So well done Greenbelt and Moot.  To integrate all our resources at Greenbelt, see the links below.

If you liked what you saw of the Moot Community at Greenbelt – then do make contact and come along to one of our events or gatherings.

1. Information on the music we used at Greenbelt compiled by Jonny Spoor our music master at Greenbelt.

2. Photographs of Mooters at Greenbelt – please add in photos if you have any others to share.

3. Information exchanges going on in our Facebook Moot Group.

4. Information for new people interested in attending moot events or participating in the community – register on this site and see our info for new people

5. Interested in participating in our WEDNESDAY MEDITATIONS, SERUM discussion group or ENNEAGRAM training see here for details

6. Interested in our service liturgies, contemplative and meditative resources – see our mootique.

7. Need more info? click on the contacts for Ian Mobsby for general information, or Jonny our communications person

1. Helios- Keith Kenniff aka Helios/Goldmund (he goes by a variety of names) is an incredible Boston based artists. Do check out his website at www.unseen-music.com for some free mixes and tracks. Most of the tracks I played were from the two Helios albums Eingya and Caesura. Eingya has been one of my favourite albums for a long time!

2. Olafur Arnalds- This Icelandic composer is a recent find for me but I’ve been playing his album “and they have escaped the weight of darkness” a lot recently so do have a look at his stuff.

3. Arvo Part- A little more “traditional” but I used his “Fratres” a few times in the service. If you don’t know his music you really should!

4. Stars of the Lid- These guys are very famous in Ambient circles. Most of the tracks I used were from the album “And their Refinement of the Decline”

5.  Ten and Tracer- Another recent find, a lot of their music is free have a look here

6. Max Richter- His albums are all highly recommended!

7. Feedback loop label- This is a great netlabel offering a number of free tracks and if you like them you can buy the full albums. The address is here. Ambienteer is particularly worth a listen.

In terms of places to buy music I’d recommend www.boomkat.com over Amazon or itunes. They have a great system for downloads and their reviews and comments are very detailed. Also worth having a look at is their 14 tracks series.

And to finish a couple of blogs for ambient music that are a great read are www.disquiet.com and http://astrangelyisolatedplace.wordpress.com/. A Strangely Isolated Place is I assume named after a Ulrich Schnauss album that I’m fairly sure I used. They also run a great series of mixes.

As part of our new programme for the Autumn “term”, Moot has the privilege of embarking on a new venture next week, starting a new series of meetings working with “Serum“.

Serum is a group that already exists and meets in South-East london to discuss matters of spirituality. It is an informal group with no particular agenda, except a gathering of people from wildly different perspectives comparing notes and fostering interconnection in discussion about the various possibilities of what spirituality looks like today in people’s lives. The group usually meet in the pub, which is always the best place for such discussions.

About a year ago, Serum led a series of discussion at Greenbelt, the annual arts festival that meets at Cheltenham Racecourse every year (they also did the same this year, but I’ll come to that shortly). One of their discussions was attended by an atheist who gave Serum a very favourable write-up in The Guardian newspaper. It was clear that although apprehensive, she felt very comfortable being there, and discussing her thoughts openly. I’m really pleased that something of this nature is coming to be part of moot, and the discussions look very interesting indeed.

You can read the article on the Guardian website. Serum starts at moot on September the 8th 2010. The venue is the Cross Keys pub on Gracechurch St. in the centre of London.  For more information about the Moot Serum group click here.

In this, the second of two podcasts, the conversation between Phyllis Tickle and Ian Mobsby continues with an exploration of models of church, participation and commitment to faith communities and new monasticism. We apologise for the loss of sound quality at points in this recording caused by an electrical storm over Phyllis Tickle’s house in the south of the USA. So listen nd enjoy, Phyllis is a great person to converse with.

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