groovin at greenbelt

I’m back from greenbelt arts festival at Cheltenham racecourse. Broadly Christian event, but radical, exploratory, political and left wing/field. The racecourse itself is awesome to behold. A vast circuit, immense broad grass corridor, thick grass, its undulations and hilly backdrop enhancing its splendour. Its scale against a human athletics track accentuates what a magnificent beast is the horse, and indeed even more so, a field of them thundering round, tiny jockeys perched, hooves pounding, divets flying.

A musical highlight was undeniably Beverley Knight, R n B soul diva. A pulsating, high octane performance. Ok, and she’s a bit gorgeous to boot. This time round I was drawn to big expansive music and events, though there’s a thriving ecology of smaller scale happenings too.

Challenging thought: Richard Rohr, that the Christ, meaning the Word, the Spirit, can be found in people of many faiths and persuasions who seek goodness and truth. What place then for evangelism? I venture to suggest the explicit message of the Christian faith still brings into sharp focus the truth of who God is and what God is like, in a unique way, so that there is still an unveiling work to be done through word and deed – while learning and listening to the insights of others too.

And the hippy-est sounding event I noticed: ‘Foraging with the earth God’. Get out your trowels and wellies.