On Friday, Josh Hicks left this world. He is now with Christ. We look forward to our sweet reunion.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=67ITb8neZxU&feature=youtu.be
Prayer for the Knotted
October 13, 2011 By Leave a Comment
Years and conversations stringed between
My ears and heart have grown deaf
To memory and sun-setted afternoons.
Break open blazing ice and bring
Together those who no longer recall
Hastened words and orphaned days
Spent across metal-meshed tables,
With honeyed tea exhaling signals
Towards stacked newspapers and
Unravel knotted chest pains, dulled
Against common months and pull
Tight our fraying hearts again.
Fingers
September 30, 2011 By Leave a Comment
They remember the earthy brown highways and byways,
Curling & twisting gently down the peak before abruptly
Emptying out into nowhere.
They have followed these paths, and they have
Gathered them up;
They have redirected, and they have
Made straight the crooked.
Their memories are deep: they cannot forget
The soft & glorious trails they have traveled,
Nor would they want to.
From Journal to “Community”
September 10, 2011 By Leave a Comment
From its inception the mission of Kalos has been to help men and women think theologically and live worshipfully. At the intersection of these two “activities” we find the arts. For example, what we believe about God, man, and our world is articulated in the books we read, the songs we sing, the poems we write, the short stories we craft, the photos we snap, the pictures we paint, the dances we choreograph, etc.
Kalos Journal (click on the theme to your right, “Journal”) was but one way we tried to spark theological reflection and new bursts of creativity amongst you, the Gordon-Conwell faith community. (Kalos Coffeehouses represent another.) In the journal we showcased works of art that were the fruit of your theological reflection, study, meditation and prayer. Your artwork opened new doors of understanding, challenged some presuppositions, and inspired new fits of creativity and additional works of art. All that is to say, the journal achieved some of its goals.
If Kalos Journal did some things well, there are others it failed to do well at all. In fact, some aspects of the journal actually undermined our mission. The most obvious example is the 32-page limit. Like most things in life, the journal had to have a beginning and an end, but because of cost concerns the journal often ended sooner than we would have liked. Because of the 32-page limit, we were not able to publish all the wonderful artwork that we received. As a result, some feelings got hurt. Some people grew discouraged. And sadly, some mistook Kalos for an exclusive club, a place reserved for an artistic elite at Gordon-Conwell.
But the truth is this—all of us are artists—we are all made in the image of a good and loving, holy and just…artistic and creative God. As such, from the very beginning, Kalos has been a community of persons created in the image of God for the sake of imaging God asking the question, “What would it mean for us to image God more fully?”
In short, due to the very high costs of maintaining the journal and due to the problems alluded to above, we have taken a new course of action–namely, diverting time, energy, and financial resources away from the journal and towards a brand-new website which we are calling the “Kalos Community.” Like the journal, several themes will be announced on a bi-annual basis: once in the fall and once in the spring. Similarly, you are encouraged to submit artwork in response to those themes. However, instead of submitting your artwork to me for editorial review and then, having to wait patiently to see if your artwork “made the cut,” you will be able to upload your artwork directly to the website. (See the submission “Guidelines” page.) And like the contributor index at the back of every journal, members of Kalos Community will still be able to identify one another and their works of art.
The mission of the Kalos Community remains the same: to help Christians connect good thinking with good living, orthodoxy and orthopraxy, faith and art, word and image, and certainly, to connect members with one another. Additionally, we hope that members of the Kalos Community will continue to create good, beautiful, and honest works of art that find their place in Christ’s re-creative work. And finally, we hope that Christians will take seriously God’s command to cultivate the earth—cultivate being, of course, the verb form of “culture.” Thus, we are not simply concerned with creating good and beautiful things–we are equally concerned with protecting and promoting the good and beauty that is already present. This requires sensitivity (good eyes, ears, etc.), wisdom (good mind and heart), and craftsmanship (good hands).
Ultimately the goal is not just to innovate, but also to preserve what is healthy and flourishing in any given culture, and to pass it on to the next generation at least as good as when we arrived.
These are the goals of the Kalos Community. As always, if we fail to live up to our mission, or if you identify ways that would make this website, community, etc. better, please do not hesitate to contact me.
In Him,
John Meinen
Kalos, Sr. Editor
Alison Gerber: “Conversation”
September 6, 2011 By Leave a Comment
Like toadstools, your
red and white tennis shoes
sit obscured beneath
the hallway pot plant.
I snuck them there while
you were in the bathroom.
Now its just our socked feet
that are swinging from high
chairs in the kitchen.
Would you like another
cup of coffee? No thank you,
you reply. You brush your soft
fawn-like hair back
from your pretty eyes.
We move to the front door now
and there is empty space
where your footwear should be.
Running to the kitchen,
the bathroom, the study,
the living room where
you blame the dog,
you curse your mind,
you look at me and I
pull back the shy fronds
of the hallway pot plant,
revealing two red and white
tennis shoes and my clumsy
gesture of please,
don’t go just yet.
Alison Gerber: “Touch”
September 6, 2011 By Leave a Comment
It’s difficult to embrace you. It’s
My brother, picking up a baby for the first time,
and the blobby shape of her body
that he can’t quite fit onto himself.
Her limbs are hanging down like limp backpack
straps, he’s sure there must be
some technique, some clasps?
There was that time I saw you
by surprise. I was standing
on the stairs and only later thought of
running down and
Debbie found out from her doctor friend
she is going to be just fine.
Overwhelmed with gratitude,
she picked up her jacket and
left.
