Frank Wesley’s “Forgiving Father” is one powerful image. It’s formed from a life-size wood block and was exhibited at an exhibition at Australian Catholic University in Banyo last year. It can be found in a collection of images at the Center for South Asian Studies at University of Virginia, in their online gallery, and at the Australian EJournal of Theology.
Here’s a short biography, much of it drawing on the artist background at The Word Made Visible, Permanent Art Collection of the Lutheran Center.
Frank Wesley is well known in India. His paintings were frequently reproduced as Christmas cards by the Indian Society for the Propagation of Christian Knowledge. Frank studied painting at the Lucknow School of Arts in Delhi. He took his graduate and post-graduate work there and eventually joined the faculty, staying for 12 years. From there he went to Kyoto, Japan to spend five years at its College of Fine Arts. From Japan, Wesley went on to the United States and studied at the Art Institute of Chicago. After two years in the United States, Wesley returned to India. In 1965 he joined the Christian Association for Radio and Audio-Visual Service as a part-time staff artist. In the last part of his life he lived in Nambour, Queensland. He died in 2002.
“My main work,” said Wesley, “is to paint the Bible in our own Indian way. It is to do something for the church in the field of art.”
Wesley belongs to the Lucknow school of painting. His guru was Bireshwar Sen, one of the foremost students of the late Aribindranath Tagore (cousin of the poet), a famous artist and founder of the Bengal school of painting. Mr. Wesley’s paintings reflect this influence and that of the Chughtai school of painting that flourished in India at the turn of the century.
Naomi Wray wrote about Wesley in her book, “FRANK WESLEY : Exploring Faith With a Brush”. Auckland, New Zealand: Pace Publishing, 1989.
Geraldine Wheeler has written a ‘catalogue essay’ at the Australian EJournal of Theology. Lindsay Farrell has written meditations on Frank Wesley’s “Forgiving Father”.
This Sunday I’m looking at distorted images of God. On Father’s Day we face the temptation of thinking all the best thoughts about fathers and then saying that God is the ultimate Father. But sadly our perspectives on the nature of God are skewed by our experiences of family. Instead, we’re challenged to reshape our approach to family based on the healthier images of God found in Scripture.
Juanita and Dale Ryan, in their 1990 study, “Recovery from Distorted Images of God”, provide some really helpful debriefing on this matter. The book’s no longer in print but it’s available for free as a downloadable pdf from the National Association of Christian Recovery.
Juanita says:
“None of us lived in perfect families. Many people have experienced parents or other family members as emotionally distant, unreliable, abusive, unrealistic in their expectations, inattentive or abandoning. As a result, we may see the God of the Bible through distorted lenses. These distortions interfere with our ability to talk honestly with God, to share our feelings with him and to trust him. Our distorted images of God keep us from fully experiencing his love.”
I’ve led groups through this material and found a mixed response. Some people don’t enjoy deconstructing their images of God. It’s actually quite painful to let go the ‘God’ you’ve had all your life. Others have found it a liberating experience to acknowledge that their family environment was not ‘perfect’ and that they are still on a learning curve.
“What ought we to do when we find that we serve a god who is not God? There is only one answer in the Bible. Throw the bum out. Get rid of him. It is an idolatrous attachment, and it can’t be reformed, restructured, rehabilitated or restored. This is not a point where it is appropriate to be moderate. We need to clean house. The god who gives us nothing but fear or shame is not God. Fire him. Or her.”
Geoff Bullock’s been engaging with some very interesting blog conversation over at Signposts this last week. Phil and Dan are posting updated lyrics for Geoff’s earlier songs, lyrics that reflect his changes in theology since leaving Hillsong. Some of Geoff’s comments are raw but there’s a grace that flows through them all. Also of interest is the Sight Magazine interview with Geoff published this time last year.
This Sunday night at Logan Uniting I’m looking at the healing of our distorted images of God. I daresay there are a few distortions that come from the assumptions developed in church cultures, including Hillsong. More on that later.
Hurricane Katrina is being watched online around the world, from the perspective of satellites. This image comes from the weather.com site - giving us a sense of the movement of the hurricane over two hours.
At the Web Logg-Ed blog, Will gives educationalists ideas on how to connect students with information on the hurricane using:
So the New Zealand All Blacks managed to keep the edge on South Africa in Saturday’s Tri Nations rugby union game at Carisbrook in Dunedin. The score: 31-27. Maybe a deciding factor was the new haka written for the All Blacks and performed for the first time. Usually the haka is led by a Maori member of the All Blacks. This time it was led by Tana Umaga, a Samoan New Zealander. It was just as impressive.
Performing a haka certainly stirs the spirit. As a university student I lived at Knox College, an all-male hostel at the time. When it came time for inter-hostel swimming carnival all 150 of us performed a haka beside the swimming pool. If my memory serves me right we didn’t win the carnival but we did make an impression.
For more on the traditional haka see the NZ Folk Song website or Tu Strategies.
For the pronunciation of vowels:
a as in car
e as in where (1st e)
i as in me “hi” sounds like “he”
o as in awe
u as in put or foot
See the Maori Language site for more clues on dipthongs and consonants.
KIA WHAKAWHENUA AU I AHAU!
Let me become one with the land HI AUE, HI!!
KO AOTEAROA E NGUNGURU NEI!
This is our land that rumbles AU, AU, AUE HA!
And it�s my time! It�s my moment! KO KAPA O PANGO E NGUNGURU NEI !
This defines us as the All Blacks AU, AU, AUE HA!
It�s my time! It�s my moment! I AHAHA! KA TU TE IHIIHI
Our dominance KA TU TE WANAWANA
Our supremacy will triumph KI RUNGA KI TE RANGI E TU IHO NEI TU IHO NEI, HI!
And will be placed on high >PONGA RA!
Silver fern! KAPA O PANGO, AUE HI!
All Blacks! PONGA RA
Silver fern! KAPA O PANGO, AUE HI, HA!
All Blacks!
Scot McKnight, author of the book, Jesus Creed, has changed from www.jesuscreed.blogspot.com to www.jesuscreed.org. He’s done a great job of transferring all the old posts - so you wouldn’t even know that there had been a change.
Scot is the Karl A. Olsson Professor in Religious Studies at North Park University. The author of more than ten books and numerous articles and chapters in multi-authored works, McKnight specializes in historical Jesus studies as well as the Gospels and the New Testament. I’ve valued his role of scholar in the Emerging Church conversation. His recent posts on post-Calvinism provide both academic and personal land marks for the journey. His University site is here.
One of my kids is writing a research essay on Aboriginal religion.
“When the first missionaries came to Australia, they believed that the Aborigines had no religion. This false belief took a long time to disappear and is still believed by small pockets of the population, despite the deep and rich religious tradition of our original Australians… Why did it take so long to recognise Australian religion?”
The first missionaries came in the early nineteenth century, decades after convicts and settlers arrived in Australia. They inherited an already established view that the Aborigines were sub human or mere curiosities. Why didn’t the missionaries recognise the existing religion? We’ve been talking about the nature of Aboriginal ritual, myth and sacred place. And thinking about the focus of English missionaries on systematic theology, sacred buildings, English civilisation. “Christianise and Civilise” was the catch-cry of colonialism in reference to new countries. Add to that the lack of a developed phenomenology of religion.
The essay is struggling. But it better be done soon!
Can you imagine George Bush singing John Lennon’s song, “Imagine”? With a little imagination, George’s speeches can be mixed, morphed and poured into the song.
Tom Compagnoni, an independent recording artist based in Sydney, Australia, set up Wax Audio to capture, transfigure and promulgate mass-media mixed with recycled beats, original samples and a wealth of material taken from the digitized multi-track tapes of previously recorded works. In addition to sourcing, editing and arranging the audio data for each piece, he plays guitar and percussion on many tracks. He has released two EPs in the last couple of years - WMD …and other distractions and Mediacracy.
Mediacracy presents appropriated media sound bytes that deliberately set out to demonstrate the way information is manipulated to present any particular point of view. Playing the media like an instrument, Wax Audio juxtaposes found sounds in a way that forces the listener to confront the bias, contradiction and sensationalism inherent in their daily intake of media information. By filtering everything else out, bombarding them only with selected keywords and phrases, alternating the context and never pausing for breath, Mediacracy paints a stark picture of the Media’s role in our technology driven world.
The John W Bush version of “Imagine” has found its way into the ether and appeared on a number of sites.
Imagine there’s no heaven,
It’s easy if you try,
No hell below us,
Above us only sky,
Imagine all the people
living for today…
Imagine there’s no countries,
It isn’t hard to do,
Nothing to kill or die for,
No religion too,
Imagine all the people
living life in peace…
Imagine no possesions, I wonder if you can,
No need for greed or hunger, a brotherhood of man,
Imagine all the people sharing all the world…
You may say I’m a dreamer, but Im not the only one,
I hope some day you’ll join us, And the world will live as one.
The Youth Multimedia Discussion List I’m on has been enjoying the promotion of WaitWear - a clothing line designed to bring about awareness of abstinence until marriage and celebrating virginity. The brand has stores in Georgia, New Mexico and Wisconsin.
T-Shirts, camisoles and undies have messages such as:
“I’m Saving It”
“No Over Nite Trespassing”
“Virginity Lane. Exit When Married”
“Traffic Control: Wait For Marriage”
“NOTICE - No Trespassing on this property. My Father is watching.”
Postkiwi Duncan Macleod posts on life, faith and culture in Australia, drawing from his involvement in the creative industry, the Uniting Church, the blogosphere, generational research, the emerging church and life on the Gold Coast.
“None of us lived in perfect families. Many people have experienced parents or other family members as emotionally distant, unreliable, abusive, unrealistic in their expectations, inattentive or abandoning. As a result, we may see the God of the Bible through distorted lenses. These distortions interfere with our ability to talk honestly with God, to share our feelings with him and to trust him. Our distorted images of God keep us from fully experiencing his love.”
Geoff Bullock’s been engaging with some very interesting blog conversation over at 
So the New Zealand All Blacks managed to keep the edge on South Africa in Saturday’s Tri Nations rugby union game at Carisbrook in Dunedin. The score: 31-27. Maybe a deciding factor was the new haka written for the All Blacks and performed for the first time. Usually the haka is led by a Maori member of the All Blacks. This time it was led by Tana Umaga, a Samoan New Zealander. It was just as impressive.
Can you imagine George Bush singing John Lennon’s song, “Imagine”? With a little imagination, George’s speeches can be mixed, morphed and poured into the song.
The Youth Multimedia Discussion List I’m on has been enjoying the promotion of WaitWear - a clothing line designed to bring about awareness of abstinence until marriage and celebrating virginity. The brand has stores in Georgia, New Mexico and Wisconsin.
When you’ve run out of iPod accessories, here’s where to go…
Postkiwi Duncan Macleod posts on life, faith and culture in Australia, drawing from his involvement in the creative industry, the Uniting Church, the blogosphere, generational research, the emerging church and life on the Gold Coast.
