The same, but on a different planet

Here’s where I have been for the last couple of days. It’s a golf resort just outside Myrtle Beach in South Carolina in the USA, although the bizarre reality of modern life means that it is actually just outside the door of a series of metal boxes which I sat in for several hours so I have no idea where it was really… however that is what they told me.

I was there to be part of a men’s weekend for an Anglican church from slightly further down the coast.

It was a fantastic weekend, really. It’s been the Superbowl in the US this weekend, so the flavour was dominated by that, but it’s fun to see people get excited about something, even if you have no real idea why on earth they don’t just play Rugby.

What I also noticed, though, was the marked difference to the venue for our men’s weekend. We go to a 12^th century priory (now a diocesan outdoor centre - http://www.marrickpriory.co.uk/about/history/foundation.html) where we sleep in dormitories. Here we were in a small village with bathrooms ensuite to the bathrooms.

Both are good, but I do wonder what our American brethren would think to Marrick.

I mention it because I notice a terrible tendency in the human heart to get used to the luxury of what we have and begin to take it as a minimum standard. It might be true of the luxury of the States, it is certainly true of some of the assumptions I make and sometimes I need to think a little more clearly.