It would seem appropriate to offer an attention deficit reflection on the biggest attention deficit Christian festival in the country. So, what did I make of GB10?

Remember to set aside the momentary panic that comes with arriving at GB. The search for a pitch for the tent; receiving the programme, and panicking about “what to see, what to do, when to do, what will I miss, is it all going to overwhelm me?” This too will pass. Brother Lawrence should be the patron saint of GB, or at least, the patron saint of arriving- the sacrament of the present moment is the only thing that will get you through Friday afternoon.

Friends: old, new and unexpected. This is the most important part of the GB experience. Eventually I fall into a rhythm: event, one hour off with friends, event, and so on. That’s how it should be.

Specific events and impressions:

Stanley Hauerwas is a lot ruder (and funnier!) in person than you can possibly imagine from even his most polemical writing. However, the format of reading from his memoirs didn’t really work; there was too much I wanted to digress from (what are the implications of that throwaway remark?), or needed more context (who is Fred?).

However, the evening session on “America’s God” was a remarkable presentation, critiquing the fascination (unquestioned) by most Americans that “civil religion” is the apotheosis of Christianity and civilization (especially on a weekend in which Glenn Beck was committing all kinds of heresy). Some apercus: “the American middle class is the best bought off peasantry in history”; there is a difference between saying curse words and using curse words; the English are the most uncivil people in the world (but in a good) way; the bishops of the Church of England are more interested in protecting their privileges than condemning the evils of nuclear weapons (one suffragan bishop squirmed in his seat at that one).

Cole Moreton (“award winning journalist” for The Guardian) was especially disappointing. His jaunty, inaccurate, broad-brush and incoherent history of the spiritual and religious life of Britain over the last twenty years was, and this is a technical word, rubbish. He wanted to hand major spiritual shifts on the passing of “minor” pieces of legislation (never making it clear whether the legislation was cause or symptom of said shift). So, for example, when the government changed Sunday trading laws, the Church of England surrendered its moral authority by investing in retail parks, including the Metro Centre. Why should we take any notice of what they say in future? At the same time, in the next paragraph, when the government loosed the country from the Church’s dead-hand monopoly on weddings (silly me! I thought that had happened in 1753 and 1948!), the Church of England refused to capitulate to the consumerist mood which was unleashed, by insisting that people attended church to hear their banns being called, and refusing to allow confetti in the churchyard, whereas the hotel down the road allows you everything you want, and gives you a glass of champagne to boot.

Which is it Cole? The Church follows the mood of the age (shopping centres) or the Church refuses to follow the mood of the age (weddings)? Or would you prefer to criticise for both approaches? I am always grateful when journalists write about religion: it makes me aware of how many half-truths are being peddled in the economics, sport, politics and international sections of the paper as well. (There was also a number of snidey “Unlike the Church of England, I belong to a church which actually believes something…” questions.)

Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove: if you attended his talk on “does God want you to be rich?” expecting the answer “yes”, you would be disappointed. But not with the content and delivery of his talk, which, beginning with teaching an Anglo audience how to sing spirituals unaccompanied (“clap on 2 & 4 not 1 & 3), and going through the most touching and provoking stories, won the prize for “talk most likely to challenge my complacency” at GB10.

Giles Fraser on the Church of England and the English Civil War. There are some films which are made with such brio and panache that you are willing to overlook the plot holes. There are some films which, although tightly plotted, are made in such a lumbering, repetitive and unbelievable manner. Fraser’s talk combined the worst of both worlds: it was repetitious in its delivery, with digressions and cul-de-sacs where he obviously had just thought of something and wanted to shoehorn in it (John Locke sat next to Christopher Wren at school? Who knew?); it was fatally flawed in its analysis of the Restoration Church of England as the “peace treaty” for the long wars of religion from Henry VIII onwards— if the Restoration Church and the Book of Common Prayer was a peace treaty, it acted as the Versailles Treaty of peace treaties. It was victor’s justice, imposed with an iron hand, and crushing social and legal conformity. If it was a peace treaty, then why was it accompanied by Test Acts, Five Mile Acts, and Conformity Acts, and why do the non-conformist churches in England all date their founding from the reign of Charles II? (and it is no excuse to complain about the closed shop of the Guild of Historians, as Fraser did, either. History is interpretation, but it is based upon a number of agreed facts. Interpretation doesn’t trump reality). I have to say that the the audience loved what he had to say. I, on the other hand, think the talk might be worth listening to when Fraser finishes it.

All in all, GB10 was another excellent festival. The combination of intellectual stimulation and musical happenstance (which I haven’t even mentioned, but Megson and the Fancy Toys both deserve to be much more widely known), and the continual running into friends makes Greenbelt the oasis of the year, and water for a thirsty soul.