St Mary and St Chad, Brewood.

There is a delightful retro feel to this composition: not in just the actual posters, but in the whole layout of the noticeboard.  I love the hand drawn and coloured Olympic rings (which this time are correct in design) which helps make the whole display so endearing as someone has gone to a lot of time and effort to produce this.

As for the posters, they too are delightfully retro - the one on the left has a simple message, which leaves us to draw our own conclusions, over a drawing of two runners that could have come from a school textbook in the late seventies or thereabouts.  The writing is angled as the sole designer-y touch, to follow the route on which the race, which is to be run with perseverance, is being run.  Simple, artless and charming.  The only question is why the cross of St Patrick has been left out of the Union Flag - is the artist a secret Irish republican?

The poster on the right is also quite retro in style, but this time the torch (with its subtle cross - nice one) reminds me of the old pre-oak tree Conservative Party logo, rather than the Olympic flame.  I know the Church of England has been described as 'the Tory Party at prayer', but come on...  Nice use of an appropriate biblical quotation though, rather than going full out for the pun.

All in all a display that sums up the rural C of E.  Maybe not a gold medal, but it gets a Pierre De Coubertin medal for sportsmanship from me.

St. Jude's Church, Wolverhampton

Another glossily produced one from St. Jude's and were it not for the weather a very seasonal one.

It plays on the old-ish saying, 'Life's a beach', which itself is a play on the even older saying 'Life's a bitch' (a far more Buddhist outlook on life, incidentally which nicely sums up the first of the Four Noble Truths) and then it proceeds to take that cheap play on words and take it far, far too seriously.

Obviously it is meant to be taken metaphorically as I'm sure most people are aware that sand gets to the beach by the geological processes of weathering, erosion, transportation and deposition, but if we are looking as to why there is any beach there at all as opposed to no beach (or indeed any life as opposed to no life or anything as opposed to nothing) then fine.  Not quite Thomas Aquinas, but we get the idea.

It's a shame though that the poster doesn't actually trust its audience enough for them to work out the answer for themselves, so it has a handy shadow crib sheet beneath the deckchair to provide the answer for them.

Actually a far more interesting question from a theological point of view, would be who put the blobs of tar that ruin your towels and the bits of broken shell that get into your flip-flops there...  One for the manichaeists perhaps.

Holy Trinity Church, Hazlemere

Another one provided by a friend...

A lovely colour picture on a traditional green background and an interestingly different font from usual, make this one stand out from the crowd.  I also salute the innovation of the two part poster - whether it was designed that way, or whether this is an inspired bit of improvisation to fit the poster to the noticeboard, I don't know, but it lifts this poster above the run of the mill.

My only reservation with it is the fact that basket case is actually a fairly unpleasant slang term, which I suppose has become more acceptable through age (when was the last time you heard it used in everyday speech?), but is not a term I'd expect church folk to bandy about.

Also, much as I'd like to think that the most hopeless of mental or physical incompetents could lead their people from slavery to the promised land, I do think it may be promising a bit too much.

Still - like French movies of the 1980s, this is a wonderful triumph of style over substance.

Emmanuel Church, Chesham

Here's another one sent by a friend (ta Z.), which although not really a pun at all, is quite a nice little poster: almost Shaker like in its simplicity, with no fussy graphics, or serifs or anything like that.

Not entirely convinced of the accuracy of the message, as I am sure if there were any perfect people about they would be equally welcome, but you know what they mean and you know they mean it well.

Nice one Chesham.

Beckminster Methodist Church, Wolverhampton

A rather topical entry here, with an Olympic themed poster - it was actually on display during the games, but I didn't have time to get it photographed and posted as I was too busy watching them.  However, now that they are over let's get back to the poster.

Nice classic poster design, with some white shadowing on the letters adding depth, some nice alliteration drawing the whole slogan together and a common mis-drawing of the Olympic rings, turning them into a sort of complicated Venn diagram, which may just be enthusiastic ignorance, or it may be a cunning plan to avoid falling foul of the draconian Olympic copyright laws that saw so many shopkeepers threatened with prosecution...

I can only presume that the race referred to in the poster is a metaphorical one, as the only straight race in the Olympics is the 100m sprint as all the others are at least slightly curvy.