Astute Labs has developed, as the first of a series of related products, the School App Kit Software. School App Kit provides a service to schools, school districts and related companies around the world, through a unified web and mobile presence, including SMS and email, allowing them to communicate effortlessly with all their stakeholders.

The role of Sales and marketing Leader will be critical to the development and success of a ‘zero touch’ sales model that has already established significant customers in the UK, Middle East and USA.

Role: Sales and Marketing
Responsible to: CEO
Location: Belfast

Role Summary/Purpose
This Sales and Marketing role is responsible for leading and reaching the sales objectives for Astute Labs’ product portfolio through definition and execution of the “zero touch” sales strategy, delivery of customer and marketing action plans and growth of the company customer base. The role will be measured against agreed KPI’s and objectives defined to ensure increased sales revenue from the global target customer base.

Full Description and pdf here

INFORMATION

The reason this job is posted here is because when Vox O’Malley isn’t spouting off about Translink, theology or writing poems he runs Astute Labs Ltd, the makers of School App Kit.  That should at least be a warning to a lot of you.

The first principle of Insurrection, ‘to believe is human; to doubt, divine’ is based on the ‘cry of dereliction’ of Jesus on the cross:

“My God, My God, Why have you forsaken me?”

 (Jesus words on the cross according to Matthew 27)

Peter argues that this moment of ‘felt’ atheism is a basis for a new movement of those who ‘give up everything including God’ (p. 156) and make the ‘Centrality of Absence’ a core of their community experience.  This is what Insurrection, pyro-theology and the ‘crux’ of the book depends on.

Let’s take a look at some texts briefly:

The person in question in these quotations feels abandoned by God, he feels the chants of onlookers mocking his hopes for deliverance and goading him to trust that God will rescue him.  His clothing has been removed and the crowd gamble for portions of it.

Before I go on, ask yourself where you think those quotations are taken from?  The crucifixion story?  Yes?

No.  You’d be forgiven for thinking what you were reading above are quotes from the crucifixion story in Matthew 27.  The thing is, they are from Psalm 22, the passage that Peter argues has nothing to do with Matthew 27. Here’s how he dismisses the connection which is the main thing standing in the way of his first principle:

“In a desire to silence the true horror of Christ’s cry of dereliction, many have claimed that he was really just quoting Psalm 22 and was therefore affirming the entire content of that psalm – a psalm which, in its totality, expresses deep belief.” (p. 24)

So Peter himself knows that Psalm 22 is a psalm that is about faith, deliverance, confidence in God ‘in the midst of great despair’.  This doesn’t suit the main argument that Peter wants to make (that this is a moment of intense, felt ‘unbelief’) so ‘in a desire to silence’ the connection Peter argues the following:

“this perspective, however, fails to take into account the significance of the fact that the cry recorded in the Gospels of Matthew and Mark is put in Jesus’ native tongue (Aramaic) rather than in the psalm’s original Hebrew.  In the Jewish faith, the Hebrew Scriptures are read, memorized, and recalled in the original language, not one’s native tongue, so while this cry might be inspired by the psalm, the words reflect a person’s heartfelt cry of agony and loss rather than some mere quote” (p. 25)

Except, this is wrong.  Google or Wikipedia search for ‘Aramaic Targum’ (Aramaic Translations of the Hebrew Scriptures) and you’ll see that plenty of scriptures were in Aramaic and Aramaic speaking Jews would have heard translations alongside the original Hebrew to help their understanding.  This, therefore is not an argument.  In fact it is incredible how carelessly something so obvious was overlooked.

In addition to this Peter absolutely and utterly has failed to read the full Matthew 27 passage and Psalm 22 together.  Read them for yourself side by side just once. No one can ignore the fact that Matthew 27 is shaped in the light of Psalm 22.  In fact, we might even say it has sections added (such as garments divided by lots) to make sure it fits.  I’ve laid out a few of the main ones to make it easy for you:

What is even more important to prove the point is not just if the words are the same but if the ‘theme’ is the same and we discover it significantly is.  I would go as far as to say that it is highly possible that Jesus is murmuring through the words of Psalm 22 in the midst of his ordeal and this provokes the reactions of the crowds and the themes of how Matthew is recorded.  There are a lot more arguments (consider the final ‘it is finished’ cry with the final words of the psalm) to back this up but these are enough to make the main point.

So what?

In summary, Insurrection is based on

- Jesus ‘felt atheism’ on the cross

– Argued by dismissing its widely held connection to Psalm 22 (a Psalm of strong belief in the midst of ordeals)

Above I have shown that this argument fails, sadly, miserably and carelessly. Insurrection’s first principle is vapour and everything based on it blows away.

So Insurrection cannot be a movement as ‘epochal’ as the great circumcision debate in the early church. This is what Peter claims in the book itself.  Any grand claim must expect to be judged with some care.  The argument has no fuel or reality in anything concrete.  It is, a great, compelling idea and of that there is no doubt.  If you are going to have ideas and try and hang them on texts that are of central importance to the church community then you should give those texts due respect. When I read Insurrection I give the words enough respect to consider them before reviewing.  You would expect at least the same of the scriptural texts.  You don’t have to believe in them being ‘more than books’ to at least treat them as not ‘less than books’.

Magnesium?

In Peter’s introduction he said that ‘pyro-theology’ was to help us ‘burn our sacred temples in order to discover what, if anything, remains.”  I was up for that, as an addict to the protest tradition in the testaments, the anti-religious movement of prophets and agitators right through to the condemnatory figure of Jesus, I am, and still could be a potential convert. Just not yet.

In chemistry class we used to ‘acquire’ small strips of magnesium for ‘homework’.  There was great pleasure in holding the magnesium above a candle in a set of tongs waiting for the show.  Magnesium once ignited burns, oh how it burns!  The brightest, white flame we had ever set eyes on.  And then out.  A flare lasting a second at least, with no fuel to sustain its fire.  That is what I fear this pyro-theology is.  A brief, interesting, hopeful chance to purify and illuminate but without enough substance to last, to purge or to be anything more than an exciting adolescent flash that we recount from time to time.

Addendum: Endorsements and Audience

This is no doubt a product of the current post evangelical socioreligious zeitgeist. The fact that Rob Bell and Brian McLaren endorse it so uncritically says as much about their need for affirmation. My book has the affirmation on the cover by Rob Bell, “Great, really, really great.”. Ouch. The publishers are putting it out there as something in keeping with a rock song to get ‘likes’ rather than  a polemic on one side of a ‘circumcision question’.  They believe the market is people who would like to like the things Rob Bell would like.  I’ve no doubt Rob Bell had no say on the choice of quote (the back cover is much more Rob!) but it does show you where the publishers position this book.

The sun sparkles in spring sky
Framed in ice blue energy
Addictive air of anticipation
These days have only just begun

The sun soars in summer sky
Fuzzed in haze and alcohol
Indulgent heady living
There should be no setting on these days

The sun settles in autumn sky
Drying the deciduous and tired
The hangover of the year
And the days begin to turn again

Not so the bore I met this week.This one was shockingly worse.

I was visiting family when a gathering was taking place in their living room. A gathering of older men intent on various business. As their meeting concluded I and my two daughters were introduced to the various guests as they entered the kitchen. The subject of this blog, whom I shall refer to only as ‘T’ must have been caught off guard, and by off guard I mean he had sufficiently relaxed into himself that he was truly being himself and not the protected projection of himself he would use in his day job.

I sat at the table chatting with my own daughters as some common or garden competitive holiday story telling began with T and my other family members. My flight was better than your flight, I’ve been to the same place as you, I ‘see’ your week in place ‘x’ and raise you three weeks and a first class flight in ‘y’. You’ve seen all that before. I don’t get involved in the sparring. So far, so normal.

My family member then indicated to them, pointing over to me, that I (Vox) was going to Tennessee next month in an effort to bring us all into the conversation. Usually a bore would at least ask ‘What takes you to Tennessee?’ or some other feint. Not this one, ‘T’ immediately turned to me, an as yet unacknowledged individual in the room and declared, ‘I have an organisation I work with in Nashville, I’m over there quite regularly and will be over again in February’.

I couldn’t. Quite. Believe it.

Mild boredom with the competitive holiday sparring now turned to downright irritation. I smiled and acknowledged the awesome tale with more appreciation than it deserved and politely continued with my daughters.

Speaking of my daughters, the two of them, polite little girls of 8 and 5 were then introduced to ‘T’ by my family member. His response to these smiling little bundles of fun? A question to them? How are you girls? What are you getting for Christmas? Any inane acknowledgment of their existence?

No, the presence of kids is a perfect opportunity to discuss his own granddaughter. He ignored the introduction to them and instead stated, “I have a granddaughter, I have a photo here somewhere”, proceeding to scroll down an iPhone to find a picture of a child that wasn’t in the room and ignore the two children that were in front of him. He couldn’t find the photo and instead told us a hastily remembered tale of how she, a 9 year old, had used the letters in her first name to make up various sentences. Cute, fine. My 8 year old, unprompted and perhaps getting the social tone that this was about competing stories declared, “we do that in school, I did sentences with ‘Easter’ and ‘Spring’”. Touché girl.

A few minutes later ‘T’ was asked if he had seen the new iPhone 4S (which I have and my day job is running an apps development company). Making what I thought was safe conversation I stated that the voice recognition, Siri, was quite amazing. This was intended to be common ground / isn’t tech amazing kind of conversation. But no.

‘T’ declared that his son, who he was extraordinarily proud of for living in the US, having an important job and for buying them first class seats on the return flight from their last holiday, this son ‘said the EXACT OPPOSITE of that, the voice recognition on the Android was much better’. Again, I couldn’t quite believe it, a completely unnecessary attack on my attempt at general conversation by articulating again the superiority of his own son. Why the polemic? Don’t social occasions require more subtlety?

I could barely stand it at this stage, my neutrality had been tested and I entered the skirmish, saying, “No, that isn’t true, Siri is an incredible advance in natural voice recognition and beats all other systems hands down at the moment”. I couldn’t resist and needed to slap ‘T’ back into position just for his incredible rudeness.

In summary, so far, ‘T’ had managed to assert the superiority of his son, their job and opinions on technology; he had used our children as an excuse to discuss his own grandchild and had used the mention of Tennessee to mention the important organisations he works with there and travels there ‘all the time’. He ignored the humans present asked no questions of anyone in the room and blandly told ‘impressive’ tales of his own life and absent family members.

I think you get the picture.

But the most surprising thing about ‘T’ and this whole scenario was that ‘T’ is, wait for it, a Pastor.

Yes, someone who dedicates their life to looking after the cares and worries of countless souls, someone to turn to in times of illness, distress, moral and spiritual discomfort, someone to look to as an example of a serving heart. The meeting they had just finished was the board of a charitable mission to India, helping widows and orphans. Guess what would happen the next time someone mentions “India” in conversation to ‘T’?

Instead the person I met that day was intent on preening their plumage, vicariously boasting via the deeds of their family. This pastor simply arrived into my life and with swelling chest shouted,

“Look at me underlings, am I not GODLIKE? Do I not have progeny worthy of my DIVINITY? Do my seed not bear witness to me, their FOUNTAINHEAD? Do my charitable deeds not indicate my RIGHTEOUSNESS? Are you not IMPRESSED?”.

He obviously did not say that. Except, in effect, he did.

So, I said the following:

“I barely know you, but what I have learned in these brief few minutes is that you are a person wholly unsuitable for pastoral office. You show no real interest in people who are not part of your paid employment to serve and instead have used this opportunity to declare to us your own wonder and have caused unnecessary competitive urges in those present. I’m tired of you now, I suspect this charity is another vehicle to brag about. I bid you farewell, for as Jesus said, ‘you have your reward’. Your reward is a puffed up chest, haughty eyes and a golden goblet full of bilious drink that will never satisfy you.”

Except of course, I didn’t say that. But, I wished I had.

For your further Reading:

Matthew 6: Giving to the Needy, Hypocrites, Blowing your own Trumpet

With the greatest of thanks to G K Chesterton for long ago showing us it was ok to write short ‘essays’ like this:

The Fool, by G K Chesterton

I use your website frequently to check my train times. I want to use the train, I want to save the world/environment/money on taxis.

So on Saturday I negotiated your slightly clumsy website (we’ll overlook that for now) to check the trains from Carrickfergus to Botanic and back again. Trains out were fine. This is what the website said for returning trains:

So, we leave our restaurant having NOT HAD DESSERT to catch the alleged 2302 train home. We arrive at 2250 to give reasonable amount of time. There don’t seem to be any trains listed for Carrickfergus. I ask the lady at the desk – she says “the next train to Carrick is the 2320″, thirty minutes later. I politely show her what translink website says are the trains on my phone. She says “Yes we are having a few complaints about the website”.

LIKE SERIOUSLY. The information is actually WRONG, BUGGY with no indication of that fact and you’ve had complaints already but haven’t passed them on to somebody to deal with?

Who project managed the change of train times and like, FORGOT to update the website, TEST the update or some other such obvious thing?

How hard is that to do in a public service or even a warning on the website that says “TIMETABLE HAS CHANGED – PLEASE CHECK SOME OTHER PLACE FOR CORRECTIONS”.

I planned my night round those facts Translink so you owe me dessert.

I’m talking maybe even a cheeseboard as well.

Grump over.

Vox O’Feckin’ Malley

Vox O’Malley demonstrating it on a variety of kitchen implements. I can make their money disappear as well.

William Crawley’s entertaining summary of his interview with Pete Rollins at ikon, Belfast.

Pete’s unfolding (apocalyptic) response to William’s question “Do you believe in God”?

Fascinating stuff: Belief, ontology, empiricism, commitment, language – all in the mix.

Voxless

Day 1

Day 4

According to the brochure:

I think the phrase “encourage Presbyterians to save through their own church“ and “for their mutual benefit” drives a horse and cart through the “legally distinct” duck and cover move we have heard (see Question 3 below).

What Assurance was given to investors?

A “categorical assurance” was given by the directors in this brochure that under no circumstances do they “speculate” with funds “entrusted to their care” but rather funds are used to advance loans to shareholders of the Society who wish to borrow.

Secondly if there is an excess of money (ie. if more money comes in than borrowers want to borrow) that excess will be invested “on the best terms available in established banks in Northern Ireland”.

So, according to this official brochure investor’s money is either out on loan to other PMS members or in cash accounts in Northern Ireland banks. The big question is one of security then? The excess money will only be invested in cash, an investment that (aside from bank collapse) does not go down.

How secure was the other money out on loans? The brochure answers these concerns:

What is acceptable as security?

The loans are secured by Property deeds, life assurance policies in excess of the amount owed and guarantors. Small loans under £5,000 were permitted unsecured which I’m sure were not a big part in the society’s collapsing asset value.

So, to any investor their money is well secured both the collateralised loans and the excess cash. Worst case scenario would be some guarantors not paying up in which case the society would have legal call on their assets or some houses used as security had significantly lost their value. Neither of these seem to be the problem with the mutual’s assets as far as we can tell. Instead somewhere along the line the makeup of the society changed to (as far as we can tell):

Questions

1. When did these rules of the society change? At some point they began to invest excess cash, not in bank accounts but directly in property and therefore expose investor’s money to greater risk than this brochure indicated. By anyone’s measure this is “speculating”.

2. Did the society inform all members of the change in their investment risks? I may have missed this discussion but so far I don’t see it on any of the news reports. Perhaps other terms and conditions contained clauses that allowed changes without informing investors? If the society had of continued with the level of security as described in this brochure their assets would not have been so radically diminished as they are rumoured to be now (40% / 50%??). In fact all the money is likely to have been completely secure. The Directors made the choice to wander from this investment approach, not the investors as far as I can see.

3. Why did a church spokesman claim in a Newsletter article the phrase describing the society was “inaccurate” when it was printed on official Presbyterian Mutual Society brochures? Does no one else have these brochures in their possession anymore?

The Newsletter article (original) states:

“Dr Watts states there is no connection between the Presbyterian Church and the Presbyterian Mutual Society,” said the reader.

“But the Church’s Board of Mission in Ireland website says, ‘The Presbyterian Mutual Society was established in 1982 to encourage Presbyterians to save through their own church and manage such savings for their mutual benefit to enable shareholders to borrow at a competitive rate of interest’.”

[this seems to be the exact wording of the brochure above, yet...]

A spokesman for the Presbyterian Church said the website statement was “inaccurate”.

He said: “No one has denied the links between PCI and PMS and the blurring of divisions that has led to this inaccurate statement that encourages Presbyterians to ‘save through their own church’.

“The particular website it appears on was an interim site of the Board of Mission in Ireland and should have been taken down before it launched its official site at www.missionireland.org.

“However, it serves to illustrate that while the Church and the society are separate legal entities, that has at times been unclear.”

So at its outset the society gave indications in its literature of its clear (“categorical assurance”) of security, anyone looking at the information would feel that their money was safe. At some point things changed dramatically from that first advertised. Did future brochures (post 2002/2003) indicate this change in where investor’s money was going? And, more importantly were pensioners who had invested their retirement lump sums or redundancy money on the basis of the brochure I have informed by letter or some other method that their money had changed from a secured loan / cash investment to a part speculative property fund?

I hasten to add that I have not had any personal money in the Presbyterian Mutual; I am an interested member of the Presbyterian church whose day job has involved talking to many distraught elderly people whose incomes in particular have been destroyed by these events.