I picked this link up from Mark Berry’s great blog the other day, and only got a chance to listen to it tonight.  It’s a challenging call to a radical lifestyle which eludes most of us, including me.

If you read about him, please dont be put off by people calling him naff things like ‘the coolest Christian ever’ he has something important to say, and I dont get the impression that he is so ‘cool’ he’s stuck up his own orifice, on the contrary, living in community probably helps him have a very healthy sense of self.

I personally find voices like Claiborne’s both encouraging and convicting at the same time, his is a call to a very different way of living, one which presents massive challenges to all of us.

While I like to think I identify with what he says, in my heart I know that I fall way short of the standard that he and others in his community set in terms of how they live together, I guess he’s a kind of John the Baptist voice, he looks a bit like him too.  With glasses though…

Perhaps because I’m ignorant, or just not well enough versed in the right literature, but while I am well aware of the phenomenom of ‘new monasticism’, I hadnt heard of Claiborne before, I am glad I now have.  Well worth checking this out.

He also has his own homepage, should you wish to read more, and cant be bothered to google him…

Talking of Mark Berry, by the way, I think he will be hooking up with us in South Wales sometime in the autumn, to lead an evening of prayer/worship.  Should be fun.