Theological Reflection

Well after the buzz of last week (Halloween, All Saints, prayer over the visit of the Dalai Lama), I haven’t been good for much blogging this week. I realize that blogging consistently requires a certain level of personal awareness and reflection. And if one wants to describe things from a Christian perspective it also requires theological reflection – not just “This is a biblical idea” but “What is this idea saying to me or to my situation?” This week I’ve had a lot of the first but not much of the second.

I conducted a funeral this week. The deceased was only 55, thin, active and fairly healthy but died of a heart attack. He had just this past weekend finished the cottage he had been working on for years (well made it livable with plumbing and electricity). He had a 16 year old daughter who read a letter to her dad as part of the eulogy. That hit fairly close to home. I have a 16-year-old daughter. It’s my birthday in a week and 55 is, well … I’m not there yet but I can see it from here.

I also spent a day at a conference about key indicators of a transformed city. I posted about those last year. We had Glen Smith here discussing how they came up with those for Montreal. Basically the concept is “How do you know when what you’re doing is working?” If we are praying that we would have good government, that we would see neighbourhoods improved and cities transformed, then what does that really look like? How do we know we are going in the right direction?

These twelve indicators are a great paradigm but they need to be developed for the city of Toronto and many of them will be different – or at least some of them will be. That will take a lot of work – and theological reflection. If you want to check out the graphic I’ve included below in more detail, check out their website or the direct link to the twelve indicators PDF.