Well, it’s been a while since I posted a piece on how awesome I am.
Okay, it’s been about three weeks. But this time I’ve actually got something worth bragging about. Sort of. This is my one hundredth Far From Home/Cum Tacent Clament post.
“There’s a roar from the crowd and a grateful acknowledgement from the members. 100 posts in three and a half years, on two different websites and on four different continents. A superb innings in difficult conditions. Your thoughts, Richie?”
“Yes it’s been a marvellous display this. There’s been some stiff opposition at times from the combined pace attacks of England and Adelaide as well as an entertaining battle with the off-spin of AAMI insurance company. But it’s definitely Garry’s aggressive and off-beat approach that has won the day, thanks in no small part to some excellent support at the other end.”
“Yes, that’s right. I thought the partnership before lunch with Oxfam Girl was particularly good. It wasn’t the most elegant or conventional display we’ve seen, but there was no denying the sheer brute power of Oxfam Girl. When she hits them, they stay hit.”
“Yes, but all the attention was at the other end, of course, where Garry with 2 Rs has treated us all to an impressive demonstration of loquacious stroke play. He was seeing the ball as clear as a bell and large as a beach ball, and settled in early to play his natural game.”
“Yes. Now, if you’ll have a look on this replay here, you can see that Hillsong is clearly offside as she launches a cut-out pass to Samantha who backhands it down the line towards deep forward pocket for a birdie. That’s a home run in any pool in Australia.”
“The really interesting thing about it is… wait. … what?”
“Sorry, I think something’s gone wrong with the metaphor generator”.
“Ah crap. Cut to classic catches while the tech guys sort it out.”
…
Meanwhile I’ve passed a couple of other milestones lately. I’ve reached ten runs for the season for Palmerston (unusual), brought my net debt to the bank to under $30,000 (unimpressive) and turned twenty seven (unprecedented). Also, the cool change I mentioned a couple of posts ago is looming like the edge of a monsoonal trough. But more on that anon.
I was hoping to be able to coincide my one hundredth post with my one thousandth hit since installing my hit counter, but I actually passed that back in April sometime, and I’m coming up on twelve hundred now. And I think only about half of them are my mother. The rest are probably me and Kirribilli Kim, but it’s still an achievement, right?
More importantly, the time has come to stop borrowing sign-off lines from other people. This has less to do with passing a milestone than it does with the fact that I’ve pretty much run out of ideas, but that’s beside the point.
Rehearsals for A Midsummer Night’s Dream are going well, and we’re into production week now. When I say well, I mean that the director and stage manager are starting to get a little desperate, but so far it hasn’t exceeded my normal day-to-day operational level of desperation, so I feel like I’m keeping up okay. I might even be slightly ahead. Either way, since the show opens this weekend it could be a while before I have enough spare time to post again, but you can expect a full update on all the goings on backstage, including all the juicy gossip about how many cast members managed not to fall hopelessly in love with Phil Denson.
Once the play is done and dusted, I’ve got a month full of family visits coming up. This means getting my house looking presentable and making sure my car is serviced and spotless before my father gets his hands on it. And somewhere in there, we’re still planning on shooting a short film. So yes, life continues at its normal operational level of desperation.
And just a brief reminder: this post will not feature a carefully selected borrowed sign-off line.
…
Garry with 2 Rs
21 June 2010
10 June 2010
Half a Dozen Good Reasons Why I Should Have Studied Statistics at Uni.
A few posts ago I alluded to the possibility of backing up my rather controversial claim that Darwin has too many religious leaders. I say controversial because everyone I’ve spoken to about this idea has had a slightly different opinion on the matter and, in a state of affairs that may be without precedent, only about half of them thought I was completely off my rocker. And when I say religious, for the time being I’m just talking about Christian Church leaders. I have no facts to hand on how many leaders other faith communities might have in the area.
The amount of difficulty I had getting my hands on the figures I do have is almost worth another post of its own down the track a bit, but for now I’m just a little perplexed at the stats in front of me.
According to my guy in the Darwin Christian Minsters’ Fraternal, Darwin has no fewer than 52 different church groups*. And even that list is not comprehensive as it leaves out a few Catholic parishes and small home groups who are off doing their own thing. And then there are inter-congregational organisations like Scripture Union, YWAM, Rhema FM and the Bible Society. In a movement which is, in general terms and with a few exceptions, struggling for membership locally, this strikes me as strange. Why do we need so many congregations?
But then I did some sums. They are only simple multiplications and fractions, but in my advanced state of number hating, it took me about half a day to compile them.
An average Australian church has an attendance of about 65 people*. That takes into account average-wreckers at both ends of the scale, like home churches with only half a dozen people and places like Hillsong with half a dozen thousand or so*. If you multiply those 65 people by the 52 congregations in Darwin, that gives you a local Church of about 3380. Despite my previous assertions, that doesn’t sound anything like enough. So now I find myself, asserting we have too many leaders, but not enough Christians. I haven’t yet made up my mind whether that’s complete nonsense or not.
Then there’s the national average church attendance rate of 11.7 percent of the population* to consider. If you run that percentage through the greater Darwin population of 120,000*, you get a weekly church attendance of about thirteen and a half thousand, give or take.
So where the bloody hell is everybody?
There are two possible explanations for this discrepancy in the figures, which are of course based on averages rather than role calls. The first is that my list of churches is even more uncomprehensive than I thought, and there are actually more like 200 congregations out there somewhere. Somehow that seems unlikely.
The more likely explanation is that the national averages don’t actually apply to Darwin, which is culturally an entirely different country (some might say planet). I suspect weekly attendance here might be well below the national average, given the transient nature of the population and high proportion of military personnel, who aren’t generally renowned for their religious piety. I also think on average, from what I’ve seen, our congregations do better than 65. I’m not sure why. Of course, I’ve only really been around the larger congregations. I guess we have little ones out there too.
So essentially I’m back where I started. I have no idea what percentage of Darwinites attends a Christian church. I have an incomplete, if surprisingly long list of local congregations, but no information on the attendance figures for them. And conspicuous by its absence is a record of the total number of local Christians. I’ve tried to get at that, but short of placing an enquiry with the Australian Bureau of Statistics (a pursuit that experience has taught me to avoid) that information doesn’t seem to be available anywhere. Somehow that bothers me, but I don't know why.
I still think we have too many churches and not enough members, but for now it doesn’t seem possible to prove it mathematically. At least not for this numerically disinclined stunt linguist. And therein lies an issue for another day.
And that’s the good news.
Garry with 2 Rs
*What? You weren’t actually expecting a reference, were you? What kind of legitimate researcher do you take me for?
The amount of difficulty I had getting my hands on the figures I do have is almost worth another post of its own down the track a bit, but for now I’m just a little perplexed at the stats in front of me.
According to my guy in the Darwin Christian Minsters’ Fraternal, Darwin has no fewer than 52 different church groups*. And even that list is not comprehensive as it leaves out a few Catholic parishes and small home groups who are off doing their own thing. And then there are inter-congregational organisations like Scripture Union, YWAM, Rhema FM and the Bible Society. In a movement which is, in general terms and with a few exceptions, struggling for membership locally, this strikes me as strange. Why do we need so many congregations?
But then I did some sums. They are only simple multiplications and fractions, but in my advanced state of number hating, it took me about half a day to compile them.
An average Australian church has an attendance of about 65 people*. That takes into account average-wreckers at both ends of the scale, like home churches with only half a dozen people and places like Hillsong with half a dozen thousand or so*. If you multiply those 65 people by the 52 congregations in Darwin, that gives you a local Church of about 3380. Despite my previous assertions, that doesn’t sound anything like enough. So now I find myself, asserting we have too many leaders, but not enough Christians. I haven’t yet made up my mind whether that’s complete nonsense or not.
Then there’s the national average church attendance rate of 11.7 percent of the population* to consider. If you run that percentage through the greater Darwin population of 120,000*, you get a weekly church attendance of about thirteen and a half thousand, give or take.
So where the bloody hell is everybody?
There are two possible explanations for this discrepancy in the figures, which are of course based on averages rather than role calls. The first is that my list of churches is even more uncomprehensive than I thought, and there are actually more like 200 congregations out there somewhere. Somehow that seems unlikely.
The more likely explanation is that the national averages don’t actually apply to Darwin, which is culturally an entirely different country (some might say planet). I suspect weekly attendance here might be well below the national average, given the transient nature of the population and high proportion of military personnel, who aren’t generally renowned for their religious piety. I also think on average, from what I’ve seen, our congregations do better than 65. I’m not sure why. Of course, I’ve only really been around the larger congregations. I guess we have little ones out there too.
So essentially I’m back where I started. I have no idea what percentage of Darwinites attends a Christian church. I have an incomplete, if surprisingly long list of local congregations, but no information on the attendance figures for them. And conspicuous by its absence is a record of the total number of local Christians. I’ve tried to get at that, but short of placing an enquiry with the Australian Bureau of Statistics (a pursuit that experience has taught me to avoid) that information doesn’t seem to be available anywhere. Somehow that bothers me, but I don't know why.
I still think we have too many churches and not enough members, but for now it doesn’t seem possible to prove it mathematically. At least not for this numerically disinclined stunt linguist. And therein lies an issue for another day.
And that’s the good news.
Garry with 2 Rs
*What? You weren’t actually expecting a reference, were you? What kind of legitimate researcher do you take me for?
03 June 2010
When is a Rectangle Not a Rectangle?
Yesterday, my employers booked a group of seven of us into a workshop with a motivational speaker. We weren’t really told what the sessions would entail or even what they were about. We were just told the program was called “Brilliant Attitude” and would be “unlike any other training we’d ever done before”.
The whole thing was run by a guy named Bob Allwright, whose business card describes him as a leader, mentor and inspiring speaker. He opened by showing photos of Richard Branson and other multi-millionaire entrepreneurs whose names I’ve already forgotten. It came with the usual questions about what made these people different from anyone else, and the questionable assertion that the difference between me and Richard is essentially nothing. It was suggested that all I would have to do to be as rich as Richard Branson is do exactly what he does, which I suspect is complete baloney.
According to Bob it all comes down to attitude. Essentially all we need to succeed in life is to believe that we can. The only reason we’re not all multi-millionaires is that most of us are held back by our own fears of failure or judgement. A simple examination of domestic economics renders this a questionable theorem, to say nothing of the global economy. Street kids in the slums of India aren’t going to become millionaires simply by believing they can. They have to go on “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire” like the rest of us.
I don’t want to be too judgemental about this. The idea of improving your life by starting with your own attitude is a valid one and it is, I’ll grant, an incredibly powerful thing to change your view of the world by changing your view of yourself.
But here is where it started to get weird.
The guy drew three rectangles on the board, and asked us what the drawing meant. My first thoughts were “They don’t mean anything, they’re just rectangles”. But Bob encouraged us all to look deeper, to find what the deeper symbolism of the rectangles might be and how we might apply it to our lives. After we all gave answers ranging in profundity from “a failed domino run” to “the fear of rejection in abusive relationships” we were given Bob’s interpretation. His answer was “They don’t mean anything. They’re just rectangles. Isn’t it amazing, the sort of deep meaning that our brains are able to give to completely meaningless things?”
At this point, I began to suspect that Bob might just be a complete wally.
Then he went on to give us the old post-modern chestnut about how nothing has any inherent meaning apart from the meaning we ourselves give it. His point was that the only person who can stop us from achieving and give us an attitude of failure is ourselves, and that’s all well and good. But since when was I charge of the rest of the universe? If it’s true that I’m the only person who can control me, then it’s also true that I’m the only person in the world that I’m in control of. So not only does that leave me with no more personal empowerment than I had in the first place, but it also leaves me with a rather disconcerting sensation that the entire world is hurtling toward anarchistic self-destruction. Personally, I think that’s of much greater consequence than the question of whose fault it is if I get angry while I’m driving a car, but for some reason Bob didn’t mention the more troubling implications of his philosophical statements. He was too busy telling us to give ourselves more success in life by looking at ourselves in the mirror and smiling.
Actually, from a Christian point of view, Bob got it half right. Unfortunately it’s the half he got wrong that has all the important implications. The Bible is quite clear that outside of God, nothing in the material universe is of any real cosmic significance. The things we fear, the things we trust in, the things we struggle against and the material things we worship don’t actually have any power over us apart from the power we give them in our own minds. The rectangles are just rectangles.
It’s Bob method for breaking free from those cosmic rectangles that left me with a bad taste in my mouth. The idea was to break through the powers that bind us in our lives and keep us from achieving the things we want by believing in ourselves. To put it in religious terms, we can be saved from the troubles we have brought on ourselves by faith in … ourselves.
Now, my self-esteem is as healthy as the next guy, but I’m not for a moment convinced that putting faith in me is a good idea. Yes, I’m intelligent and ambitious, and spirited and deep and all the other things that make humans so brilliant, but I’m also arrogant, deceitful, envious and fearful and all the other things that make humans so full of crap. Furthermore, I’m also the one who got myself into this mess in the first place, remember? This, in my view, is where post-modern humanism falls into a pit of its own construction, and where the notion of an external creator, redeemer and sustainer begins to appear a more plausible explanation for the continued success of the human race.
Bob’s final demonstration was to get us all to write down the things that are holding us back on a piece of plywood, about 18mm thick. I wrote down a few things that have been troubling me lately, but honestly, by this stage I was done with taking Bob’s instructions seriously. On the other side we wrote down the life we wanted to lead, where those problems were gone and we could have the things we desired. Just to stick my point to Bob, I wrote down “not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, says the LORD (Zechariah 4:6).
Bob told us we were going to break through the problems and reach our dreams by breaking through the plywood with our hands. Honestly, looking at the thickness of the wood, I doubted if I would be able to punch through it. Bob told us that the secret was to look past the board, believe in ourselves and know that we had the power to reach our goals.
Actually, the secret was to place the board between two chairs, kneel on one of the chairs and bring our full weight down on the plywood. I probably couldn’t have broken the board with the strength of my arm. I sure as hell couldn’t have broken it with the power of my mind (sorry Bob). But no plywood board is going to withstand 90 kilograms coming down on it through the two square inches at the base of my hand.
So there you have it. I may not have the brilliant attitude Bob was looking for, but at least I came away with the knowledge that, while I may not be able to turn myself into a billionaire by believing I can, at least I have the ability to spot four hours worth of philosophical hokum when I’m force fed it. That, and a broken piece of plywood.
And that’s the way it was.
Garry with 2 Rs
The whole thing was run by a guy named Bob Allwright, whose business card describes him as a leader, mentor and inspiring speaker. He opened by showing photos of Richard Branson and other multi-millionaire entrepreneurs whose names I’ve already forgotten. It came with the usual questions about what made these people different from anyone else, and the questionable assertion that the difference between me and Richard is essentially nothing. It was suggested that all I would have to do to be as rich as Richard Branson is do exactly what he does, which I suspect is complete baloney.
According to Bob it all comes down to attitude. Essentially all we need to succeed in life is to believe that we can. The only reason we’re not all multi-millionaires is that most of us are held back by our own fears of failure or judgement. A simple examination of domestic economics renders this a questionable theorem, to say nothing of the global economy. Street kids in the slums of India aren’t going to become millionaires simply by believing they can. They have to go on “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire” like the rest of us.
I don’t want to be too judgemental about this. The idea of improving your life by starting with your own attitude is a valid one and it is, I’ll grant, an incredibly powerful thing to change your view of the world by changing your view of yourself.
But here is where it started to get weird.
The guy drew three rectangles on the board, and asked us what the drawing meant. My first thoughts were “They don’t mean anything, they’re just rectangles”. But Bob encouraged us all to look deeper, to find what the deeper symbolism of the rectangles might be and how we might apply it to our lives. After we all gave answers ranging in profundity from “a failed domino run” to “the fear of rejection in abusive relationships” we were given Bob’s interpretation. His answer was “They don’t mean anything. They’re just rectangles. Isn’t it amazing, the sort of deep meaning that our brains are able to give to completely meaningless things?”
At this point, I began to suspect that Bob might just be a complete wally.
Then he went on to give us the old post-modern chestnut about how nothing has any inherent meaning apart from the meaning we ourselves give it. His point was that the only person who can stop us from achieving and give us an attitude of failure is ourselves, and that’s all well and good. But since when was I charge of the rest of the universe? If it’s true that I’m the only person who can control me, then it’s also true that I’m the only person in the world that I’m in control of. So not only does that leave me with no more personal empowerment than I had in the first place, but it also leaves me with a rather disconcerting sensation that the entire world is hurtling toward anarchistic self-destruction. Personally, I think that’s of much greater consequence than the question of whose fault it is if I get angry while I’m driving a car, but for some reason Bob didn’t mention the more troubling implications of his philosophical statements. He was too busy telling us to give ourselves more success in life by looking at ourselves in the mirror and smiling.
Actually, from a Christian point of view, Bob got it half right. Unfortunately it’s the half he got wrong that has all the important implications. The Bible is quite clear that outside of God, nothing in the material universe is of any real cosmic significance. The things we fear, the things we trust in, the things we struggle against and the material things we worship don’t actually have any power over us apart from the power we give them in our own minds. The rectangles are just rectangles.
It’s Bob method for breaking free from those cosmic rectangles that left me with a bad taste in my mouth. The idea was to break through the powers that bind us in our lives and keep us from achieving the things we want by believing in ourselves. To put it in religious terms, we can be saved from the troubles we have brought on ourselves by faith in … ourselves.
Now, my self-esteem is as healthy as the next guy, but I’m not for a moment convinced that putting faith in me is a good idea. Yes, I’m intelligent and ambitious, and spirited and deep and all the other things that make humans so brilliant, but I’m also arrogant, deceitful, envious and fearful and all the other things that make humans so full of crap. Furthermore, I’m also the one who got myself into this mess in the first place, remember? This, in my view, is where post-modern humanism falls into a pit of its own construction, and where the notion of an external creator, redeemer and sustainer begins to appear a more plausible explanation for the continued success of the human race.
Bob’s final demonstration was to get us all to write down the things that are holding us back on a piece of plywood, about 18mm thick. I wrote down a few things that have been troubling me lately, but honestly, by this stage I was done with taking Bob’s instructions seriously. On the other side we wrote down the life we wanted to lead, where those problems were gone and we could have the things we desired. Just to stick my point to Bob, I wrote down “not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, says the LORD (Zechariah 4:6).
Bob told us we were going to break through the problems and reach our dreams by breaking through the plywood with our hands. Honestly, looking at the thickness of the wood, I doubted if I would be able to punch through it. Bob told us that the secret was to look past the board, believe in ourselves and know that we had the power to reach our goals.
Actually, the secret was to place the board between two chairs, kneel on one of the chairs and bring our full weight down on the plywood. I probably couldn’t have broken the board with the strength of my arm. I sure as hell couldn’t have broken it with the power of my mind (sorry Bob). But no plywood board is going to withstand 90 kilograms coming down on it through the two square inches at the base of my hand.
So there you have it. I may not have the brilliant attitude Bob was looking for, but at least I came away with the knowledge that, while I may not be able to turn myself into a billionaire by believing I can, at least I have the ability to spot four hours worth of philosophical hokum when I’m force fed it. That, and a broken piece of plywood.
And that’s the way it was.
Garry with 2 Rs
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