John Bell is going to be in Brisbane later this month, taking workshops on worship, spirituality and ecology for the Uniting Church. The workshops are open to anyone to attend. They should be good.
I have a lot of time for John. The Wild Goose songs have been a staple for me ever since I encountered them in my theological education days in Dunedin, back in 1989. It was a welcome relief to find words that were both poetic and real, most with tunes that could be sung easily. Being raised on traditional Scottish folk music, the Iona Community music connected with me deeply.
John’s teaching style is highly participatory. No PowerPoint. No need for accompaniment. Just voices and conversation.
Details at the TURN blog (Theological Understandings and Reflections).
The Crusaders (Canterbury) take on the Vodacom Bulls in Durban while the Blues (Auckland) take on the Sharks in Pretoria for the first Super 14 rugby union semi-finals without an Australian team. Contrary to original plans, the games will both be played on Saturday May 12.
The Bulls did the impossible over the weekend to beat the Reds, 92-3, pushing themselves up from fourth to second, leaving the two New Zealand teams in third and fourth and forcing them to travel to South Africa for the semifinals. That was a great score, considering they were pushing their luck to get the 72 point lead needed to pull off the move to second place.
Here’s one of the TV ads from the Super 14 2006 season…
Freeview, New Zealand’s free-to-air digital television service, was switched on in Auckland on Wednesday April 26. The service will make available digital quality material from TV1, TV2, TV3, C4, Maori TV channels, plus Radio New Zealand National and RNZ Concert programmes.
Only problem is that to receive the digital broadcast New Zealanders will have to invest in a set-top box (up to $300) and a satellite dish (up to $400) to get the Direct To Home broadcast (DTH). Eventually the digital channels will be available via Digital Terrestrial Telvision (DTT) and the satellite dishes won’t be needed.
A couple of weeks ago I had a chat with a family member who’s working with Sky in New Zealand, who work with the satellite system as well. It appears as though Sky is not in the least worried about the free-to-air rollout. If you’re going to fork out for a satellite dish, you may as well connect up with Sky, and access the huge range of channels they offer. TVNZ expects to launch a 24 hours news channel in September, and a family channel called ‘Home’ in March 2008. CanWest Mediaworks, owner of TV3 and C4, hasn’t revealed its plans for extra programmes.
We’ve been receiving digital television at home in Australia for the last four months. It has been worth the investment of a set top box but we haven’t had to worry about the cost of a satellite dish. Australia free digital television went with terrestrial UHF transmission right from the start. What convinced us to upgrade was the ghosting analog reception that became worse once digital signals started. It’s great having DVD quality TV now, though occasionally the signal falls out altogether. ABC and SBS have put in extra channels and Channel 7, 9 and 10 have added interactivity to their channels. I’m hanging out for the chance to have an affordable High Definition television to make the most of the digital offerings, and even to record in HD quality. That would be good.
John Bell is going to be in Brisbane later this month, taking workshops on worship, spirituality and ecology for the Uniting Church. The workshops are open to anyone to attend. They should be good. 
