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Community of Hope: Photo Archives

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Matt Stone

2005-11-11

Guess what? I discovered a whole bunch of photos from some past Community of Hope events yesterday. Yay. I thought these had been lost when my old hard drive crashed a year ago so I’m really pleased to recover them. I’ve always wanted to post a photo archive of our experiences on the web so now I can.

For those that have never heard of it, Community of Hope is a non-denominational ministry that was set up by my mate Philip Johnson in partnership with Ross Clifford in Sydney Australia many years ago to connect with the spiritual journeys of New Age seekers. Their experiences in this ministry formed the basis of their book “Jesus and the God’s of the New Age.” The latest printing of which also includes input from John Drane, the well known UK author.

I have created two new albums on my sidebar entitled Mind Body Spirit Festival and Winter Magic Festival. We held stalls at both of these festivals but unfortunately I am not sure what years the photos relate to specifically. I haven’t found photos from the Mingara Festivals yet but who knows – I’ll keep looking. Anyway, hopefully the photos will give you a bit of a feel for the festivals. I still have to tidy up the captions but, hey, one thing at a time. As far as I know these are the only photos from Community of Hope, Sydney in existence. Since I understand this sort of ministry is now taking off in the UK some of you who are trying it out may be interested in the early history before there was an emerging church.

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2 responses to “Community of Hope: Photo Archives”

Digger

2005-11-12

Do they have a website or anything-the Communities of Hope people? I’d be interested in checking them out a bit more, sounds pretty interesting.

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Matt Stone

2005-11-12

There is no ‘official’ website.
Community of Hope has brought together some amazingly creative thinkers and missiologists at the coal face of New Age Mission but chronic underfunding has been an ever present reality. Edgy doesn’t pay!
However, that doesn’t mean you can’t connect up. If you want to find out more the best starting point is the book I linked above. Then of course there’s Philip’s blog which I also linked above. He’s piecemeal released quite a bit of material over recent months so I recommend scanning back through his archieves and the associated links for starters. Don’t be afraid to email him either but leave it a few weeks as he’s on an electronic sabatical while his house is being extended.
You may also be interested to know that a number of Community of Hope veterans and respected friends form the core of a forum I moderate at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/thinplaces/ Feel free to check us out. If you’ve got specific questions I’m always happy to answer as well.
PS. I see you’re from Victoria. There’s a Melbourne offshoot that you may want to contact direct. They don’t do the tarot stuff but are doing festivals so I suppose it all depends what you’re most interested in. Email Philip for the contact numbers. If he doesn’t get back to you within a reasonable timeframe get back to me.

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