Jim Cotter on the Road

Venues and dates

JIM COTTER

Jim Cotter on the Road

Last updated on Wednesday 19 July 2006

Wordsmith

Godstriver

Cairnbuilder

Webtrembler

Exploring the spiritual

Encouraging seekers

Challenging old understandings

Introduction

Jim Cotter is a wordsmith who enjoys writing and speaking. He writes from within the Christian tradition, though often on the boundaries of the Church, seeking to shape prayers afresh and make connections between faith and everyday life by exploring such issues as sexuality, healing, and ministry. He publishes as Cairns Publications.

He is an ordained member of the Church in Wales (Anglican/Episcopalian). Since 2000 he has been facilitating the Small Pilgrim Places Network, a resource for those asking how we might bring to life small churches and chapels as places of quiet prayer, simple hospitality, and thoughtful conversation, especially for those who find themselves on the edge of the churches and for whom most church life does not connect with their deepest longings and questions. He is 'hospitaller' to a small church in North Wales, Llandecwyn, exploring this possibility over a seven-year period from 2000-2007.

From time to time he leads retreats and workshops, and he also on occasion lectures, preaches, and broadcasts, usually making one long trip abroad each year. He has been visiting the United States of America, Canada, Aotearoa/New Zealand, and Australia since 1981.

Among those who can vouch for him are Alan Jones, Dean of Grace Cathedral in San Francisco (alanj@gracecathedral.org) and Albert Ogle, Rector of St George's Episcopal Church in Laguna Hills (aogle@cox.net) in the USA, Colin Wright (colinjoy@xrtr.co.nz) in New Zealand, and David Conolly (dconolly@mira.net) in Australia.

More personally, he enjoys meals and conversations with friends, seeing plays and listening to music, and sauntering in the hills and by the ocean.

Themes and Books

* Praying the days and seasons

Out of the Silence ... Into the Silence

Prayer at Night's Approaching (Published in the USA by Morehouse)

Prayer at Day's Dawning

Prayer in the Day

Prayer in the Morning

* Exploring the pilgrim path

Exploring

Pilgrim Prayer

Waymarks: Cairns for a Journey

* Asking questions about sexuality

Pleasure, Pain, and Passion: Some Perspectives on Spirituality and Sexuality

Quiverful: Reflections, Meditations etc particularly concerning same-sex relationships

* Delving the darkness

Healing - More or Less: Reflections and Prayers at the End of an Age

Brainsquall: Soundings from a Deep Depression

Expectant: Verses for Advent

* Celebrating and serving communion

Yes . Minister?: Patterns of Christian Service

Love Re-membered: Resources for a House Eucharist

Darkness Yielding: Angles on Christmas, Holy Week, and Easter

* Exercising hospitality

Love Rekindled

* Laughing at ourselves

No Thank You, I'm 1662: Cartoons at the Giving of the Peace

* Unfolding the Psalms

Through Desert Places: A version of Pss.1-50

By Stony Paths: A version of Pss. 51-100

Towards the City: A version of Pss. 101-150

These three books are published in the USA by Morehouse as one volume, with the title Pilgrim Psalms

* Silence, Solitude, Simplicity

* Fantasy and Imagination: Apocalyptic and Parable

* The God of violence an idol

Further Information, Orders etc from

Jim Cotter
Dwylan
Stryd Fawr
Harlech
Gwynedd
LL46 2YA
U.K.

Telephone (+44) (0)1766 781 368

E-mail jim@cottercairns.co.uk

Presentation

An evening of formal talk, prayer, and discussion
Conducting a quiet day or a weekend retreat
A day workshop on crafting prayers
A workshop on producing liturgy
A formal lecture on any of the themes or subjects of the books
A Sunday sermon
A poetry reading on any of the themes
Being interviewed in the style of a conversation with my host

Fees and Expenses

Negotiable on Robin Hood principles.

Unlikely to be less than £90/$150 per morning, afternoon, or evening.

Exception for inner-city parishes or student groups, for which occasions I ask expenses only.

Plus travelling expenses - negotiated contribution to overall total when on tour.

One suggestion: negotiate the minimum, charge participants in such a way that fee and expenses, and your overheads, are met if a modest number register; if there are more, we split the extra fifty-fifty.

Questions for Conversation

How can our sexual desires serve the purposes of love, of union and creativity?
What is the character of the God we believe in? What kind of power - coercive, persuasive, vulnerable? Revenge and retribution, or reconciliation and restoration?
How can we encourage imagination and refuse fantasy? Poetry and parable vs. apocalyptic and propaganda.
How can we best gather fragments on our spiritual journey and build our cairns, our markers on the journey?
How can monastic values escape the old walls? Poverty, chastity, and obedience understood as simplicity, solitude, and silence?
What is the difference between being cured and being healed?
What language can carry our praying? How far is it possible for old metaphors still to carry meaning? How can our words rise out of the mystery of silence and fall back into the silence of God?

Venues and Dates

Follow this link for details of current and forthcoming venues and dates.

CAIRNS

JIM COTTER
CAIRNS PUBLICATIONS

Gernant
Aberdaron
Pwllheli
Gwynedd
LL53 8BG

tel/fax: +44 (0)1758 760296

jim@cottercairns.co.uk

www.cottercairns.co.uk

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