General relativity and time travel, or should that read 'relatively little time, generally, before one travels'?

On Monday I will be making my way to Christ Church, Oxford University, with Prof Neville Richardson. and our Presiding Bishop, Ivan Abrahams, to attend a conference, do some teaching, and deliver a paper at the Oxford institute.

I shall also be visiting our friends at Wesley house in Cambridge (although don't mention either visit to the other party... I believe there has been a rather fierce rivalry since the 13th century!).

To read more about the Oxford Institute you can click here:

http://www.oxford-institute.org/

I return to South Africa for my daughter"s birthday and some important meetings, and then have a chance to speak at a Methodist conference in Malaysia, and to visit and teach at STM, the Malaysian seminary. You can read about that conference here.

These are all very exciting events! I certainly feel unworthy, yet truly honoured, to be a part of such august and distinguished events! I will, of course, miss my family (however, Skype video does help!)

As usual I'll post pictures, podcasts, and thoughts here. So please do check back if you're interested.

In all of my research and preparation for these trips I have rediscovered the truth of Albert Eienstein's theory of relativity - time is truly relative, mostly time is inversely proportionate to the number of tasks one has to do before international travel. Oh well, I'll sleep on the flight!

Be patient with me - I promise to post more content soon! As for the value of that content... Well that's relative i.e., my relatives think it's great everyone else is bored to tears ;-)

Loved and blessing,

Dion (Tshwane South Africa)

Comments

[banana-boy]

This makes interesting reading - although I have some comments ...

I was born and raised in a Methodist family in Transkei/Eshowe & "Sleepy Hollow" where one of our most notable ministers was Alex Boraine.

What I found - and was constantly bothered by was how exclusionary the Methodist Church really was.

I recall some event that was supposed to take place (mid 60's) which would have welcomed some or other Zulu preacher or lecturer to our Victoria Road Methodist Church.

The parishioners would hear nothing of it and thus had to cancel this esteemed scholar being hosted in our privileged "House of God".

This always troubled me how a "supposed" House of God could at the same time be so vile as to exclude "fellow" Christians.

Maybe this is where Alex Boraine came unstuck - for his open acceptance of people of all colour was seen as verboten in conservative Pietermaritzburg - the Last Bastion of British Colonialism.

How does one reconcile with African Christians when we had separate white and black churches - of all dominations - Catholic, Church of England, Protestant and the various Afrikaner churches - some of which actually had the gall and audacity to re-print The Holy Bible and twist certain verses to make it seem that this God fellah - actually decreed that blacks and white were to remain separate.

I have asked my esteemed Methodist Minister cousins in Gauteng (two brothers originally from Bloemfontein and another female cousin from Pietermaritzburg) for feedback on some of these discrepancies - to no avail.

When, in 1970 I converted and took up the Muslim faith, my stoical non-church-going father sought out one of my cousins - a former missionary in BIAFRA to come and investigate this weird cult I had taken up; my cousin and I shared a good laugh for my father had failed to grasp that cousin Ted had been a missionary in a predominantly Muslim country.

This amongst many other hypocritical behavior and insidious practices were in fact the teachings of one Jesus The Christ ...